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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26394526">Half-Shell Lies</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/foreverHenry919/pseuds/foreverHenry919'>foreverHenry919</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Forever (TV 2014)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Betrayal, Crime Scenes, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Implied Relationships, Lies</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 10:14:44</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>26,628</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26394526</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/foreverHenry919/pseuds/foreverHenry919</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Henry’s admission to Jo and Hanson of being stumped on the identity of Julian Glausser’s killer had never sat well with them. Later, they learn that he may have also lied and told them that the DNA samples had yielded inconclusive results, so they set out to find answers for themselves.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Abe Morgan &amp; Henry Morgan, Henry Morgan &amp; Lucas Wahl, Jo Martinez &amp; Henry Morgan, Mike Hanson &amp; Henry Morgan</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>89</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>58</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. The Results of The Results</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This fic takes place at the end of the season in 2015 and centers mainly on events in the "Hitler on the Half-Shell" S01/E14 episode that aired February 2015. </p><p>I do not own "Forever" TV show 2014-2015 or any of its characters. If I did I wouldn't be writing these fics, I'd be enjoying the old and newer episodes. Well, I guess I'd still be writing fics :D</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV </p><p> </p><p>February 2015 …  </p><p> </p><p>Detectives Martinez and Hanson stood in the middle of the morgue, stopped in their tracks, stunned by the words of their ME, Dr. Henry Morgan. However, as they watched him leave, they also remained skeptical.  </p><p>Mike Hanson shoved his fists against his hips. “You believe that?” he asked his official partner, Jo Martinez.  </p><p>She sighed and flopped an arm up and down. “Guess I have no choice,” she replied. Hanson began to protest but she cut him off. “Look, Henry’s never given us anything but his best effort, his best opinion.” She shrugged and looked again in the direction of the morgue’s exit and said, “We can’t solve all of ‘em. Looks like this is one that we’ll just have to let go.”  </p><p>Hanson reluctantly agreed while shaking his head in frustration. He did like simple. Preferred it. But not at the expense of leaving a perp out there somewhere to kill again. He relaxed his frown and nodded when Jo suggested they call it a day and quench their thirst at McSorley’s. </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>June 2015 … </p><p> </p><p>It had been a trying but routine day for Jo and Hanson of rounding up a suspect and wrapping up another murder case. It had also become almost routine for them to whet their whistles and unwind after work at their favorite bar, McSorley’s. Invariably, the lovely Latina detective and their handsome British medical examiner, Henry Morgan, found themselves seated next to each other with Hanson and/or Lucas beginning to feel more and more like fifth wheels. For that reason, they began pairing off with each other either at the bar or at a separate table while Jo and Henry enjoyed each other’s company in a private booth.  </p><p>This night, however, Henry had left work early to pack for his flight the next morning to Rockville, Maryland to attend the Association for Molecular Pathologists’ annual meeting and expo. A three-day event, he was expected to be out of town for the better part of the week.  </p><p>Tonight, it was Jo, Hanson, and Lucas, seated at their usual round table just inside the bar’s main room. The discussion of the day’s case led to other cases and eventually some of the stranger ones because of their strange aspects.  </p><p>“Remember the woman who accidentally set herself on fire and burned to death while she was trying to torch her boyfriend’s car?” Lucas recalled.  </p><p>“Yeah, sad,” Hanson said. “And dumb.”  </p><p>“And the two kids who killed their parents because they had ordered them to do their homework,” Jo recalled. “Creepy kids only 13 and 15.”  </p><p>“I’ll tell you something creepy,” Lucas began. “The DNA results from that little piece of skin and eppys removed from Julian Glausser’s ring ---” </p><p>“Yeah, I remember that one,” Hanson interrupted. “Inconclusive.” He shook his head and downed the rest of his bottle of beer.  </p><p>Lucas frowned. “No, the results came through.” When he saw the looks of confusion and surprise on their faces, he continued. “But they were the weirdest results I’d ever seen.” He took a swig from his bottle of beer and plunked it down in front of him.  </p><p>"You’re talkin’ about the Glausser murder,” Hanson stated, seeking clarity.   </p><p>“Yeah,” Lucas replied.  </p><p>Both detectives were stunned but also disappointed. For that meant that Henry had deliberately lied to them back then about the results. But why?</p><p>Jo was the first to speak. “Henry agreed that these results you’re referring to were those of Julian’s killer?”  </p><p>“Yeah,” Lucas replied. “Only … whoever the killer is, they’ve got to be the weirdest person alive,” he added as he shook his head and scoffed.  </p><p>“Why do ya say that?” Hanson asked.  </p><p>"The ancient antibodies in his system,” he replied.  </p><p>“So, it was a ‘he’,” Jo stated, recalling that Henry had referred to Julian’s killer as such at the time.  </p><p>“Wait a minute,” Hanson started. “What ancient antibodies?”  </p><p>“I can only remember one offhand: Cyprian something or other,” Lucas supplied. “That was a Roman plague way back in the gladiator days. Weird!” </p><p>Up until that moment, Jo had found herself missing Henry but now she was glad that he wasn’t there to witness this conversation or to see the confusion and disappointment on hers and Hanson’s faces. She fought back a feeling of betrayal like she’d done so many other times when she’d suspected he had been hiding something. She wasn’t dumb; just waiting for him to trust her enough to let her in.  </p><p><em> “One day you’ll let me in,” </em> she’d confidently told him after they’d closed the Dwight Dziak murder case.  </p><p>He’d also held back when he hadn’t invited her or even told her about the funeral of Abe’s mother. And his odd, suspicious behavior during the Blair Dryden and Xander DeSoto murder cases when he’d tried to keep that strange dagger from her. Well, from the case. She was still trying not to take that personally. She exchanged a look with Hanson and reluctantly decided that they should have a look at that report.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>Back in the OCME ... </p><p> </p><p>“See for yourself,” Lucas said as he pulled the file out from the cabinet and handed it to them.  </p><p>Hanson opened the file so that Jo could read the report, as well. “Yersinia pestis, cyprian cough, per-pertrussian --- what does all this mean?” she asked, confused and stumbling over the pronunciation.  </p><p>“They’re human antibodies,” Lucas replied. “We pick them up from having had contact with those diseases.”  </p><p>“But I’ve never even heard of these diseases,” she said.  </p><p>“I have,” Hanson flatly remarked. He closed the folder and looked at both of them. “I watch a lot of History Channel, remember? These diseases haven’t been around for centuries!”  </p><p>“Just what I said,” Lucas interjected.  </p><p>“What? Is someone experimenting on themselves?” she asked, clearly disturbed. “Making themselves into a … some kind of … bioweapon?”  </p><p>“Well, according to the Big Guy,” Lucas began, “the killer would have to be at least 2,000 years old. That would explain the presence of ancient antibodies.” And did he even believe that? Of course, he didn’t. But he bet it would make a great short film. He studied the two detectives who looked really spooked and decided it was best to keep any filming ideas to himself.  </p><p>“That’s just … impossible,” Jo said, frowning and shaking her head and her lustrous brown curls, as well. “Nobody is 2,000 years old!”  </p><p>“Well, I do know that this Y pestis stuff ---” Hanson began. </p><p>“Bacterium” Lucas interrupted to correct him.  </p><p>“Yeah, that,” Hanson replied. “It was identified from DNA they dug out of the teeth of human remains found to be victims of the Great Plague of London which hit the city from 1665 to 1666.”  </p><p>“Okay, um,” Jo began, closing and opening her eyes and shaking her head. “Can we ditch the supernatural and just use these results to find a killer who happens to have weird antibodies and not a weird lifespan?”  </p><p>Hanson rubbed the back of his neck and nodded. “We’ll, uh, hang onto this for a while,” he told Lucas. With that, he and Jo left the morgue.  </p><p>“Okay, uh, I guess McSorley’s night out is over,” Lucas called after them. They nodded to confirm and he sighed and murmured to himself that he might as well go home, then.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>The Tech Lab 20 minutes later ... </p><p> </p><p>“This is takin’ forever,” Hanson rasped as he paced back and forth behind Jo where she was seated in front of one of the computers. Thankfully, the sparse night crew allowed them to have more privacy than if they’d been conducting the search during the day.  </p><p>“I know,” Jo replied. “But I’m betting that only a preliminary search was made. We’re going deeper.”  </p><p>This whole thing was making her feel sick, though. How could Henry lie to them like that? Had he deliberately misled them to keep them off the scent of this mysterious killer? Did he have a personal connection to this person that he’d let slip was a ‘he’? She sincerely hoped he didn’t. A fleeting thought of Abe being the killer, bent on helping him find that dagger ---. No. That’s too comical to be true, she told herself.  </p><p>But she recalled that he had, for the most part, avoided eye contact with them while he’d claimed to be stumped and that the killer being male was just a theory. She also recalled how hurriedly he had departed from them. As if to prevent them from questioning him further. Yes, she sadly concluded, he was hiding something. And she realized this latest bout of evasiveness only added to the mystery that was Henry Morgan. The computer screen beeped and ceased its online search. Jo was astonished when she saw what the DNA matched. </p><p>Hanson peered over her shoulder at the screen then straightened up, confused. “It matched an unknown sample in a different case. Which means we’re still at square one.”  </p><p>“Yeah, but it also means that our guy gets around,” Jo pointed out. “This sample was from a bloody shaving razor found at the scene of Xander DeSoto’s murder. It was ruled the murder weapon and had mostly his blood on it and a few smudged fingerprints that couldn’t be identified. The killer wasn’t trying too hard to cover his tracks.”  </p><p>“Maybe we can work with this,” Hanson speculated. “Good thing the Doc is at that symposium or whatever. He can maybe bring back some new techniques for testing blood samples.”   </p><p>“He won’t be back until the end of the week,” she informed him. “Even so, I don’t know how much help he could be since he obviously lied to us about the original sample.”  </p><p>Suddenly, the memory of him rushing past her into an adjoining room while they were at the DeSoto crime scene, played back in her mind. He’d rushed into the next room and hurriedly turned to face her with at first a look of fear on his face that had quickly changed to relief. Had he expected to find someone in that room and then was relieved when his fears were not realized? She vaguely recalled that he’d shifted his feet in an odd manner … as if he’d stepped on something. It hit her. The bloody razor. He had been trying to hide it from her. Hide it from becoming part of the evidence in the case. Why in the world would he have done such a thing? Luckily, she had stared him down and made sure that he’d left the room before she had and the razor had later been found and tagged by the CSU. The terror in his eyes, although he had tried to appear calm, had been unmistakable. She now realized that he had been deathly afraid of something or someone during that time.  </p><p>“Ya think the Doc’s been protectin’ this guy, whoever he is, and that’s why he lied to us about the DNA results?” Hanson speculated. What he didn’t say was that Henry would be in a pile of trouble if that were true.  </p><p>“I … I don’t know, Mike.” She struggled to mask the hurt and concern in her voice. “Henry is so secretive about a lot of things. He must have had a good reason to lie to us.” She had to believe that but also realized that no matter how good his reason, his actions still fell outside the law.  </p><p>Hanson washed his hand down over his mouth and shoved his fists against his hips again. “Like it or not, we still gotta chase this lead down,” he told her.  </p><p>Jo clamped her lips together and nodded, sadly realizing that he was right.  </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV </p><p> </p><p>Notes:  </p><p>Information about Association for Medical Pathologists found at <a href="https://www.amp.org/"> https://www.amp.org/ </a> </p><p>Information on the ancient plagues and viruses found at  </p><p><a href="https://hanshowe.org/2019/03/12/the-plague-of-cyprian-249-ad-to-262-ad/"> https://hanshowe.org/2019/03/12/the-plague-of-cyprian-249-ad-to-262-ad/ </a> </p><p>and</p><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yersinia_pestis"> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yersinia_pestis </a>  </p><p> </p><p>Slight references to various other episodes of “Forever” TV 2014-2015 show. </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Half-Shell Lies Ch 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p><em> “Think the Doc’s been  </em> <em> protectin </em> <em> ’ this guy, whoever he is?” Hanson speculated.   </em> </p><p><em> “I … I don’t know, Mike,” Jo replied as she struggled to mask the hurt and concern in her voice. </em> </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV </p><p> </p><p>It was late. Very late. The two detectives decided to call it a night but get an early start in the morning on trying to uncover the owner of the mysterious DNA that held antibodies from ancient diseases. They left the precinct and headed in opposite directions toward their respective homes. However, neither of them expected to get much sleep that night.  </p><p>Lucas had left earlier and was only a few minutes away from his own home. A nagging thought began to push through the numbing comfort overtaking him from two and a half bottles of beer. Glausser had been murdered in February. Here it was four months later and his detective colleagues were just now finding out that Henry had apparently lied to them about the strange DNA results. For all intents and purposes, he had ratted out his boss and maybe brought on some serious problems for him. He felt terrible. Just terrible. Lower than dirt. Lower than a slug. Lower than the dirt the slug slithered on. Lower than the smarmy mucous the slug glopped out onto the dirt that it slithered on. Lower than ---.  </p><p>Stop this, he commanded himself as he squeezed his eyes shut. He now sat on his new sofa sleeper, much more comfortable and stylish than the worn-out futon he’d had for the past four years. The one purchased with the new raise that Henry had recommended he be given. Geez. He had to figure out how to run interference for the Big Guy. Same as he had when he’d gotten that pugio to him. But what? How? Neither Jo nor Hanson were slouches when following up on a lead and he was sure that they weren’t going to let up on this until they got some answers.  </p><p>“Me and my big mouth,” he agonized out loud, running a hand through his brown thatch and resting it in a tight grip on top of his head. The only thing he could think of was to alert Abe. “He should know what to do,” he assured himself. The elderly man looked after Henry almost in a fatherly way. Yeah, call Abe. But not in the wee hours of the morning. People his age needed their sleep. Heck, people <em>my </em>age need our sleep, too, he laughingly told himself. While he yawned, he stretched his 6’2” frame out on the sofa. Contact Abe. Before he reported for work. Alarm. Alarm. Set the alarm on his cell phone. Okay. He yawned and closed his eyes again and let the numbness fully overtake him this time.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>The next morning, Lucas woke with a start. The events of the previous evening came slowly back to him and he groaned because of that and what he felt was a stress-laden, hangover headache. He had to push all that aside, though, as he recalled his commitment to himself to contact Abe. He sat up and took in a few deep breaths in an effort to shake off a growing weakness. Then the body ache and fever began to manifest themselves and he realized he wasn’t going anywhere. Not even to work. Damn! He was sick!  </p><p>The alarm on his cell phone went off and he fumbled it off of the coffee table. He stopped the alarm and checked the time on the screen: 5:45 AM. From what he recalled Abe telling him earlier that year, he was an early riser. As he dialed the number of the antique shop, he surely hoped so. After the second ring, Abe answered.  </p><p>“Abe, this is Lucas … Yeah, I sound like crap because I<em> feel </em>like crap. Listen, Abe, sorry to bother you so early but …” He paused to catch his breath and fight off the quickly worsening symptoms of flu long enough to continue with the conversation. “I, I seem to have caught a flu bug so I won’t be able to go into work … to try to fix a mess I made last night.” He paused again while Abe, confused on the other end, conveyed his condolences for his physical state but asked him “What mess?”. Lucas then filled him in on the situation and waited for him to reply. After several long moments of silence, Lucas thought maybe Abe had hung up.  </p><p>“Abe ---?”  </p><p>
  <em>(“I’m here. I’m here,” he finally replied. “I, uh … you get better. Leave Henry to me. A-and thanks.”)  </em>
</p><p>With that Abe ended the call leaving Lucas feeling like a slug again, sliming around in the dirt. All this, whatever it was, was all his fault because of him and his big mouth. He couldn’t blame the detectives for jumping into action when a possible bend of the law hit their radar; he just hoped that they realized this was Henry, the staid doctor who normally wouldn’t hurt a fly. Killing his stalker last Christmas didn’t count. Crazy guy stalks you, breaks into your house, threatens you with a sword --- you ice him!  </p><p>None of this line of reasoning or self-ridicule was doing anything to relieve either his guilt or his growing physical discomfort. He forced himself up off of the sofa and dragged himself into the bathroom where he found the liquid cold medication he’d bought last year. After checking the expiration date, he opened it and gulped some down. He then stumbled back into the living room and fell back onto the sofa where he lay awake but with his eyes closed and waited for the medication’s soothing properties to kick in.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>In the kitchen above the antique shop, Abe sat at the table with the landline phone on his left and a bottle of Scotch on his right. Occasionally, he took a long swig from the bottle and set it down roughly onto the table as he waited for his father to respond to his cryptic voicemail. Ever since Lucas’ urgent call earlier that morning, he’d agonized over whether or not to apprise his father of the potentially problematic situation.  </p><p>“No,” he said out loud to himself. “He’ll just freak out and run, disappear to God only knows where.” After a few more moments, he vowed, “If I can’t convince you to come back with me and weather through this, then you’re not going anywhere without me, Pops.”  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>At the same time, Jo and Hanson had decided to get an early start on the Glausser case and were going over the list of suspects and witnesses again. Each one they’d previously interviewed back in February had been able to account for their whereabouts during the time of the killing.  </p><p>“He’d crated up the goods and they were to be shipped out of the country to the Yanbu seaport in Saudi Arabia. Probably to some filty rich, mucky-muck of a sheik,” Hanson disparagingly noted. “Wouldn’t make any sense for anyone receiving the goods to have offed Glausser.”  </p><p>“And the murderer didn’t just kill him,” Jo pointed out. “He tortured him. According to the autopsy report, his wounds were made slowly and deliberately.” She shuddered and Hanson grimaced at the thought.  </p><p>“But it doesn’t make any sense for someone to kill him that way and not take the artifacts,” she continued.  </p><p>“Yeah, the bank representative said everything was accounted for,” Hanson added. “Maybe the murderer just ran out of time and had to leave the stuff behind,” he speculated.  </p><p>“Or maybe … the killer didn’t want any of the items,” Jo theorized. She looked at Hanson and added, “It was to teach Glausser a lesson for having broken his word not to ever sell any of it.”  </p><p>“Who would be so dumb as to do that?” Hanson asked. “I mean leave all that valuable stuff instead of cartin’ it off themselves and sellin’ it to the highest bidder? Dumb,” he reiterated.  </p><p>“Not dumb,” Jo said, her eyes widening. “Passionate. The murderer was obviously working with Glausser and Erik Haas to make sure the artifacts were returned to the right families.” She thought for a moment, biting her lower lip. “Since none of the potential recipients had any idea they were to have their property returned, they knew nothing about the group or its activities.”  </p><p>“Karl Haas’ son, Erik, accidentally stumbled onto what his old man was up to. After killin’ him, he teamed up with Glausser to make some money by sellin’ the rest of the stuff,” Hanson said. “He’s doin’ 15 to 25 at Great Meadows State Prison.”  </p><p>“Maybe Erik also accidentally stumbled onto something else in the process,” Jo said. “Like who the other members of the group were.”  </p><p>“We could go talk to him again,” Hanson said. “Even though he said he only knew about his old man and Glausser when we first interviewed him back in February.”  </p><p>“He might not know what he knows,” Jo said, a playful smile on her lips.  </p><p>Hanson chuckled, flopped an arm up and down, and said, “Okay. Let’s go find out what he might not know he knows.”  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>“Henry!” Abe exclaimed, gripping the phone’s receiver with both hands. “I was beginning to think you hadn’t gotten my message.”  </p><p><em>(“They keep us very busy here with its tight agenda,” his father explained. “And I’m sorry, I didn’t get your message, ah, voicemail, right?”) </em> </p><p>Abe closed his eyes briefly in frustration and sighed. “I might as well tell you myself.” He paused to take in a couple of breaths to calm himself and build up his courage. “The Julian Glausser murder, remember that? Of course, you do,” he quickly replied to himself. “Remember how you told me about that teeny bit of skin you fished out of Glausser’s ring? And you told Jo and her partner that the DNA results were inconclusive.”  </p><p>
  <em>(“What about it, Abraham?” the Immortal Dad asked.)  </em>
</p><p>“They now know about the real results.” Abe waited for him to reply and began to worry as the silence stretched longer than he wished. “Dad … ya still there?”  </p><p>
  <em>(“Yes, Abraham.” Henry sighed and swallowed, creating another long stretch of silence.)  </em>
</p><p>“Dad, you’re not gonna … do anything rash, are you?” Abe asked, concerned but hopeful.  </p><p><em>(“As a matter of fact, I am,” he replied. “I shall return home once the symposium has ended.”)</em>  </p><p>“No, Dad, I’ll pick you up from the airport and we’ll figure something out together and --- wait a minute. You’re coming back home?”   </p><p><em>(“Yes, Abraham,” Henry replied. “It was only a matter of time before someone in the NYPD learned the truth. It’s best that I do what I can to minimize the damage.”)</em>  </p><p>“W-well, th-that's great, that’s great!” Abe stammered in disbelief. “You’ve … had this on your mind for a while,” he stated.  </p><p><em>(“Too long,” he replied with a sigh. “I’ve always felt horrible about having lied to Jo. It’s time she knew the truth.”)</em>  </p><p>Abe was beside himself with anticipated joy. “Y-you mean you’re gonna come clean with her about … everything?”  </p><p><em>(“No, not everything, Abraham,” he gently but earnestly reproved him. “Only about this. Well, as much as I can.”)</em>  </p><p>Abe scoffed but was still encouraged. “I don’t know how you’re gonna do it but, okay, I’ll help you all I can.”  </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV </p><p> </p><p>Notes:  </p><p> </p><p>Information on Saudi Arabian seaports found at  </p><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_Ports_Authority"> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_Ports_Authority </a>  </p><p> </p><p>Great Meadows Correctional Facility is located in a hamlet called Comstock just outside Fort Ann in Washington County, NY. </p><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Meadow_Correctional_Facility">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Meadow_Correctional_Facility </a> </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Half-Shell Lies Ch 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Sorry for the shortness of this chapter but I'm trying to "think" this thing out to a semblance of believableness (if that's even a word). Thank you for your patience.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The last time that Jo had seen Erik Haas was when she had gotten him to confess to killing his father earlier that year. He had waived his right to a jury trial and pleaded guilty. After only two months into serving his 15-year sentence, it had visibly aged him. Not that he looked grayer or more wrinkled from the passage of time, it was the sallowness of his already fair complexion from minimal exposure to daylight. His blue eyes, set deeper into the under-eye hollows, had lost their sparkle. It meant that he’d seen too much that wasn’t nice or good in this place and it drew her attention away from his gaunt appearance but only for a moment. She watched him sit down across from her at the small table in the prison’s library where he was working that day. A burly, unsmiling guard hovered nearby but even she didn’t feel safe with him there.  </p><p>“Detective Martinez,” Erik greeted her. “I didn’t expect to see you here. Anywhere, for that matter.”  </p><p>“Same here,” she replied. It wouldn’t do for her to ask him if he was all right; she could see that he wasn’t. And, whatever the problem or problems were, she had to admit that she didn’t want to know. She decided to be a coward about that. He was a convicted murderer serving his time and this, unfortunately, was part of the punishment. Before arriving, she knew that she had to leave her emotions, any sympathy for him, at the door. But she had to know if he knew anything about the others who’d worked with his father in the return of stolen artifacts to their rightful owners.  </p><p>“Since you’re probably not here to spring me,” he half-joked, “I can only assume it’s because you want to talk about my Dad.”  </p><p>“Yes,” she replied and dove right in. “Can you remember anything he might have said about the other people who were working with him besides Julian Glausser?”  </p><p>“No,” he replied, shaking his head. “Dad kept all of that to himself. Big secret between him and his friends and not to be shared with his own son,” he said bitterly.   </p><p>“Yes. That’s what you told us before,” she said. “Did Julian say anything to you at all to indicate that his life might be in danger if he tried to sell any of the stolen artifacts?”  </p><p>“No, he … he only said that some of the items could never be returned to their rightful owners because it was impossible to find them all so why not sell them. He said that only the crazy people believed otherwise.” He paused, his mind traveling back to that time. “My Dad wasn’t crazy, just obsessed with doing what he thought was the right thing.”  </p><p>“Then, Julian was talking about someone else,” Jo prodded.  </p><p>Erik shrugged. “I suppose so. But you wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t come across something new. Maybe if you tell me what it is, it will help trigger a memory for me.”  </p><p>“Julian fought back with his killer,” she said. “A tiny piece of skin dug out of his ring during the autopsy yielded some strange DNA results.”  </p><p>Erik pondered for a moment, scratching the back of his head. “Well … going back to Julian’s comment about ‘crazy people’,” he began, “I do recall him saying that he would be glad to sell the stuff and get it off his hands once and for all. That he wouldn’t have to visit Bellevue anymore.”  </p><p>“Bellevue,” Jo repeated, frowning. “Had he been seeing a therapist there?” she asked.  </p><p>“Could have. I just don’t know. It just seems that crazy and Bellevue go together,” he reasoned. He unfolded his hands and placed his palms on the table, leaning toward her.  </p><p>“Look, if any of this turns out to be helpful in solving his case, do you think you could, uh, put in a good word with the Warden for me? See, usually, I work in the laundry and in the library only sometimes. I’d really like working here in the library permanently.” A spark of hope flashed in his blue eyes.  </p><p>“Well, I can’t promise anything,” Jo replied. Shouldn’t promise a thing since she and Hanson were investigating a cold case without having informed their boss, Lt. Reece. “But I’ll see what I can do.” She stood up, nodded to the guard, and he accompanied her out of the room and she left the prison.  </p><p>Once back at the precinct, she shared with Hanson what she had learned from Erik. Hanson stated that it wasn’t much and she reluctantly agreed. But no matter how much of a long shot it was, they decided to pay Bellevue’s psychiatric department a visit, anyway. Just as they began to leave, Lt. Reece called to them and instructed them to come into her office.  </p><p>Several thoughts ran through their minds as they entered her office and stood in front of her desk. Reece sat down and rested the fingertips of one hand atop a file folder in front of her. Their heart rates ticked up for fear that she had found Glausser’s file in Jo’s desk and she was on to them.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>Abe was glad he’d decided to open the shop after all. Working would help to keep his mind off of things and give him time to figure out how to help Dad. But nothing was coming to him. The phone conversation before dawn with Lucas and the one later that morning with Dad had deeply disturbed him but he hadn’t allowed either of them to know how much. Jo and Hanson reopening the Glausser murder case could pose serious consequences for the Immortal. And yet, he had decided to return and pretend to help solve the case by surreptitiously navigating them away from any real resolution. That move could get him into even hotter water than his secret being revealed. Obstruction of justice, withholding evidence, aiding and abetting … things like that were frowned upon by the criminal justice system. For the first time since he had learned about Dad’s condition and of his occasional need to run to stay safe, the irony was not lost on him that Dad now felt the need to stay and weather this storm and <em>he </em>felt the need to run.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>“Let’s talk about a couple of unsolved cases,” Reece said as she looked from one detective to the other. “Have a seat,” she said. As they sat down, Reece opened the file folder. Both detectives thought to themselves, <em> “We’re screwed”</em>. However, Reece’s next words surprised and relieved them but only temporarily.  </p><p>"One of our Techie’s, Lacey, found something interesting that appears to connect the Xander DeSoto and Julian Glausser murders,” she said and handed the file to them so that they could review the reports. Reports that Lacey had painstakingly compiled but they were already too familiar with.  </p><p>“Wow, uh, how did this come about?” Jo was able to finally find her voice to ask.  </p><p>“I personally review every unsolved case myself,” Reece began, “hoping to see if we missed something. In the DeSoto case, there was a mixture of blood on the murder weapon. The lab successfully separated and identified most of it as DeSoto’s but the other, just a trace, produced very strange DNA results. At the time, it was thought that the Lab simply made a mistake. However,” she continued, “when the same results popped up in the Glausser case, it was apparent that the Lab was either consistently incompetent in processing this particular DNA or … we have a serial killer with some very strange blood out there.”  </p><p>Their reactions weren’t exactly what she had expected and she frowned as she studied them. “Had the same thing crossed your minds, as well?” she asked.  </p><p>“To tell you the truth ---,” Jo began before being cut off by Hanson. </p><p>“--- we didn’t know what to think, either,” he said, finishing her response for her. That was actually the truth although mixed in with a lie in an effort to cover for his partner who was covering for their ME.  </p><p>Surprised, Jo looked quickly at him and then back at Reece but the guilt she felt only allowed her to briefly hold her gaze. Here she was yet again holding the truth back from her boss about something odd that Henry had done. And not only that, it appeared that Hanson had chosen to jump into the lying pit with her. It was sometimes hard to be a cop. It wasn’t supposed to be this hard to be a friend! </p><p>“We, um, only just recently learned about this,” Jo said, not wanting to divulge anything further but still needing to pad their lie with another layer of truth.  </p><p>“Well, that’s all we can do,” Reece quickly said. “We investigate leads whether they pan out or not.” She instructed them to keep the file with the reports and wished them good luck as they left her office.  </p><p>They walked back to their desks but their feet felt so heavy. Guilt, Jo concluded. And a kernel of growing anger at Henry for having caused both of them to feel the need to lie for him. Hanson held the file that Reece had given them. He sat down at his desk and eventually opened it even though he didn’t expect to see anything inside of it that he and Jo hadn’t already discovered.  </p><p>Jo looked over at him and said she was ready to leave for Bellevue whenever he was. When he didn’t reply, she got up and walked over to his desk where he appeared to be engrossed in the contents of the file.  </p><p>“What is it?” she asked.  </p><p>“Remember the case where we pulled Raj Patel’s cab out of the drink?” he asked.  </p><p>“Yeah,” she replied.  </p><p>“And we were able to connect him and that autopsy victim, Smight, because they’d both been vaccinated for Hep B,” he continued.  </p><p>“Because they both had worked at Bellevue,” she said, understanding where he was going with this train of thought.  </p><p>“Maybe our mystery killer with the scary blood was required to get the same vaccination,” he speculated. “Based on what you said Erik Haas told you, he could be either a current or former employee at Bellevue.”  </p><p>“Ready to take a run over there now?” she asked with a slight smile.  </p><p>“You bet!” he enthusiastically replied.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>“Pretty sure we need a warrant for this,” Hanson said as they entered the hospital.  </p><p>“Maybe we’ll get lucky a second time,” she told him. “Henry’s therapist, Dr. Farber, works here and he was very helpful the last time we were here.” She filled him in on how Farber had shared confidential medical information on a psychiatric patient who turned out to be a man named Clarke Walker.  </p><p>“Wait a minute, the same guy the Doc killed when he broke into his home last Christmas?” he asked. She nodded, yes. “Wow. And you think he’ll just turn over some more information again without a warrant? I mean there are HIPAA laws, Jo.”  </p><p>"What HIPAA doesn’t know won’t hurt her,” she joked.  </p><p>“Not a him or a her, Jo,” Hanson protested. “We could get into real trouble doing this. And he could, too!”  </p><p>“Relax,” she urged him. “We’ll be fine.  </p><p>They now stood in front of Dr. Farber’s office door and Jo knocked. The door was soon opened by an attractive African-American woman about the same age as Lt. Reece. “Can I help you?” she asked.  </p><p>“Yes,” Jo replied. She and Hanson displayed their badges and ID’d themselves. “The last time I was here, this was the office of Dr. Lewis Farber.”  </p><p>“Oh, well, I’m Dr. Latrice Palmer. This is still his office but I’ll be working out of it until he’s able to return to work,” she informed them.  </p><p>“You said ‘able to return to work’,” Jo said. “Is he out ill?”  </p><p>“Guess you’d have no way of knowing but he was attacked in the subway last month. He’s been a patient here ever since in Room 310.”  </p><p>They thanked Dr. Palmer and hurried over to the hospital’s patient-housing wing and went to the 3rd floor Nurse’s Station where they ID’d themselves.  </p><p>“We’re here to see Dr. Farber,” Jo told the nurse.  </p><p>“If you’re here to try to get any information out of him about who attacked him, you’re out of luck,” Nurse Hampton said. “He’s unable to communicate with anyone.”  </p><p>Curious and concerned, they listened as the nurse provided more information about his condition. Then they thanked her and slowly entered Farber’s room. As they drew near to his bed, they were shocked and dismayed to see him flat on his back with an oxygen mask over his nose and mouth. He lay with his arms on top of the covers and straight by his sides, the rise and fall of his chest and his open eyes the only indications that he was still living.  </p><p>Jo felt just awful seeing him like that. She’d only met him once but he had struck her as being nice and polite. Henry had proudly addressed him as being a fellow Englishman. She wondered who could have done such a terrible thing to him to cause him to be paralyzed and unable to speak, all the while wide awake. Sadly, she realized, they weren’t going to be able to question him. She drew closer to him not knowing what to say to him but feeling strongly that she should. If he was aware of things like they’d been told, then he would probably recognize her from that one visit.  </p><p>“Dr. Farber,” she began, “I’m Det. Jo Martinez with the NYPD. I don’t know if you’ll recall but I visited your office just before Christmas last year with my ME, Dr. Henry Morgan. You helped us by giving us information on one of your patients, Clarke Walker.” She cleared her throat and continued. “I just wanted to say it’s a shame what’s happened to you and that I hope you get better soon.”  </p><p>There was no detectable movement from him, not even a blink. It mortified her that the man didn’t appear to have the ability to even blink! She swallowed and stepped back to the foot of his bed where Hanson stood, frowning at him. Apparently, he, too, was mortified by the man’s condition.  </p><p>“Let’s go,” she told him.  </p><p>“Sure,” he replied. “Gimme a minute.” He stooped down and peered into the plastic wastebasket next to the bed. With a blue glove, he retrieved something from out of it and dropped it into a small, plastic Ziploc bag. He then walked back to the foot of the bed and positioned his cell phone in front of Farber’s chart. “Cover me,” he told her.  </p><p>“What are you doing?” she gritted over her shoulder but stepped back to block anyone’s view of him.  </p><p>“Just cover me,” he told her again and then he snapped pics of the chart’s three pages. He straightened up and quickly pocketed his phone. “We can leave now.”  </p><p>They quickly left Farber’s room and exited the hospital. As they buckled up, Jo asked him why he’d photographed Farber’s chart.  </p><p>“I’ll know better once we get the pics blown up,” he told her. “But it looks like Farber has the same blood type as our mystery suspect, AB negative. I thought it was worth a shot to get it documented.”  </p><p>Jo scoffed. “Farber?! You think he might be our suspect?” She laughed out loud. “Why, he’s one of the most soft-spoken, most mild-mannered men I’ve ever met!” She laughed more, shaking her head as if to shake off Hanson’s reasoning for his actions.  </p><p>“Why, then, did you want to go see the guy?” he challenged her.  </p><p>“I thought maybe he could point us to another of his patients or co-workers the same as he had pointed us to Clarke Walker,” she replied.  </p><p>“Anyone’s a suspect, Jo,” Hanson reminded her. “And ya gotta wonder --- what did he do that was so horrible that someone thought they had to lay him low like that?”  </p><p>She didn’t reply although she still couldn’t wrap her head around Farber being anything other than what he had appeared to be: a mild-mannered psychiatrist with an English accent crisper than Henry’s. “Have it your way,” she finally told him. “Drinks are on me next time if I’m wrong.”  </p><p>Hanson chuckled and replied, “You’re on.”  </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV </p>
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<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Half-Shell Lies Ch 4</h2></a>
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    <p>The shrill of the small bell above the door of Abe’s Antiques rang out and Abe looked up to see his next customer. Instead, he saw someone he hadn’t expected to see.  </p><p>“Henry!” he exclaimed, remembering to address his father by his given name while in public. “Why didn’t you tell me that you were coming back today? I could have picked you up from the airport.” He quickly walked around the retail counter to meet him.  </p><p>“It wasn’t necessary, Abraham,” he replied. He set his luggage down and patted his son on the arm, fighting the urge to embrace him. Onlookers like the three customers in the shop may not understand. “I decided to skip the dinner party after the symposium’s formalities and took an earlier flight back.”  </p><p>Abe eyed him for a second and asked if he was headed into work. “Tomorrow”, is all Henry replied. He then grabbed one piece of luggage while Abe grabbed the other, and they went upstairs and into Henry’s bedroom. “Do you think it wise to leave your customers alone down there?” he asked his son.  </p><p>"Awww, if they were gonna buy anything, they would have done it by now,” Abe replied with a dismissive wave of his hand. “Now, any bright ideas yet on this, uh, situation?” Abe asked him.  </p><p>Henry sat down on the edge of the bed and said, “No. I’m just going to have to wing it, as they say.”  </p><p>“Dad, you have to have a plan,” he urged him.  </p><p>“There is no plan, Abraham, other than keeping them from finding out the truth about Adam. He will eventually die and be free of his waking coma and he’ll be out for revenge against me. If they find out about him, he’ll hurt them, as well. He said he’d never harm you; and we both know that he can’t do me any real harm.” Henry had jumped up off of the bed and now paced back and forth in front of Abe. “The plan is to somehow prevent him from harming them or anyone else.”  </p><p>“And just how do you plan to do that?” Abe pressed.  </p><p>“There has to be a way,” his father replied, his true frustration level manifesting itself. “I just have to … stay one step ahead of them. Throw them off track.”  </p><p>“You mean like you threw them off the track of that pugio but Jo did a switchback on you and wound up with it anyway?” Abe cynically reminded him.  </p><p>“That was … unfortunate,” he conceded. “I’ll be more careful this time.”  </p><p>“And you won’t have Lucas to help you this time, either,” Abe cautioned him.  </p><p>“Why? What do you mean?”  </p><p>"He’s laid out with the flu,” Abe explained. “Sounded terrible when I spoke with him this morning.”  </p><p>“Perhaps I’d better look in on him,” Henry proposed.  </p><p>“Not before you shower and get a good, home-cooked meal under your belt,” Abe told him. “While you get cleaned up, I’ll take care of these straggling customers and close up the shop. Then, I’ll start dinner.”  </p><p>Henry smiled and didn’t put up much of a fight. Hotel food could only go so far to satisfy his appetite. It would be great, he told himself, to enjoy one of his son’s hearty, delicious meals again.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>Once back inside Jo’s assigned vehicle, Hanson advised her to “hang a left” at an intersection she would normally have crossed. She did so but asked where they were going.  </p><p>“The Lab at the precinct takes two weeks or more,” he replied. “The chem teacher at the high school down the street is in my bowling league. He’ll be tickled pink to help out the NYPD on a murder case,” he said with a chuckle. “We’ll get the results in no time, if I’m right.”  </p><p>“That’s not an authorized lab, Mike,” Jo cautioned him.   </p><p>“Authorized, schmauthorized,” he replied. “We’re breakin’ all the rules on this case, anyway. Besides, the school gets state and federal funds to stay in operation. So, if the school’s chem lab is good enough for the Governor and Uncle Sam, it’s good enough for me.”  </p><p>Jo shook her head disapprovingly but drove to the school and opted to wait in the car while he “did his thing”.  </p><p>Upstairs in the school’s second-floor chemistry lab, Hanson greeted his geeky-teacher-bowling-friend, Stan Worth, and explained the situation to him. Despite the fact that Hanson felt Stan had a tendency to romanticize his job as a homicide detective, he was thankful that it wasn’t on the level of Lucas’ hero worship for Henry. Plus, he was a genius and the detective was sure he could come up with the results faster than the precinct’s lab.  </p><p>“So, is this blood from a real homicide?” Stan asked as he made preparations to begin the testing. He took the plastic bag with the blood-stained cotton swab stuck to the bandaid from Hanson and then opened the bag and removed the items. After he snipped a tiny, bloodied piece from the cotton swab, he placed it back into the bag and gave it back to Hanson.  </p><p>“Exactly what do you need?” Stan asked him. Hanson replied that he needed to find out what antibodies were in the blood. Stan filled his cheeks with air and blew it out. “Okay, but it’ll take a couple of days for the results.”  </p><p>Hanson thought for a moment, then shrugged and reluctantly agreed. What other choice did he have? It was better than waiting weeks for their lab to do it. He told him that he’d check back in a couple of days, then. They shook hands and he left. As he approached the car, he saw Jo pecking onto her phone and using her fingers to count, as well. He got into the car and buckled up.  </p><p>“Cell phones have calculators, ya know,” he joked.  </p><p>“And I’m using that too,” she replied, “to tally up how many laws we’re breaking and how much time we can expect to do behind bars if we’re caught.”  </p><p>“Oh, c’mon, Jo. I’ll bet this isn’t the first time you’ve covered for the Doc,” he speculated in a joking manner. When he saw her cringe and grow silent, he apologized and said, “Look. Everything’s gonna be all right. Once this is all over, we’ll probably even get promoted,” he said in an effort to lift her spirits.  </p><p>“Yeah,” she replied, skeptical. “In an alternate universe.”  </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV</p><p> </p><p>Notes: </p><p> </p><p>Sorry for this chapter being so short. I'll try to make up on the next one. Hope you enjoy it anyway.</p>
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<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Half-Shell Lies Ch 5</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Dinner of swordfish steaks stuffed with spinach, feta, and garlic exceptionally complemented the tossed green salad and roasted red potatoes. Henry wiped his mouth with his napkin and placed it next to his empty plate.  </p><p>“Ohhh, that was something that I missed while away,” Henry moaned in delight. “You are the best!” he declared and sprung up from his chair. Abe thanked him and began clearing the table until his father stopped him.  </p><p>“No,” he insisted. “You rest while I take care of the dishes.” Abe protested but he insisted once again and Abe relented, smiling. </p><p>“Okay, Pops,” he told him. After a few moments, he left the kitchen, realizing that his father was using the time to work things out more in his mind. He retired to his bedroom and switched on the TV to a local news channel. Although he enjoyed staying informed by reading the newspaper, sometimes it was just easier to sit back and let the news jockeys jabber the updates to him.  </p><p>It only took Henry an hour to clear the kitchen. He turned off the lights in there and in the sitting area, then checked in on his son only to find him sprawled out on his bed, fast asleep. Henry covered him up with the blanket from the foot of the bed and switched off the TV and room lights. He then retired to his own bedroom. Before settling down, though, he decided to give Lucas a call. </p><p>Lucas had finally begun to feel a bit better and was thinking of trying to get a little soup down, only he didn’t have any soup. Dang! When his cell phone rang, he grinned widely at seeing the name on the Caller ID.  </p><p>“Hey, Big Guy, how you doin’?” he asked. He then coughed.  </p><p><em> (“Fine, fine, but you don’t sound well at all,” Henry replied, concerned. “Are you in need of anything?”) </em>  </p><p>“No, no, I'm (cough) fine.” He swallowed repeating, “I’m fine.”  </p><p><em> (“Have you seen a doctor?”)  </em> </p><p>“Not … no, it, it’s okay. Matter of fact, I’m planning to go to work tomorrow.”  </p><p><em> (“You’ll do nothing of the sort,” Henry adamantly forbid him and then instructed him to drink plenty of fluids and get plenty of rest. “And if your fever hasn’t broken in two days, I’ll be over to check on you.”) </em> </p><p>Lucas didn’t know how Henry knew that he had a fever. Something only a doctor would know, he told himself. But he appreciated the medical advice. Still, he had to let his boss know what he might be facing at work tomorrow now that Jo and Hanson knew about the strange DNA results.  </p><p>“Doc, uh, there’s something you should know,” he reluctantly began. "It's something to do with those ---” Henry cut him off, letting him know that he'd already learned of the situation from Abe. “I’m really sorry, Big Guy. Didn’t mean to rat you out like that.”  </p><p><em> (“Of course, you didn't, Lucas. It was all a misunderstanding for which I take full responsibility,” Henry assured him. “Now that they do know about the results, I’m sure that the detectives and I will do our best to work harder to match them to the suspect.”) </em>  </p><p>Lucas released a deep sigh of relief. “Boy, I was so worried that you’d be pissed!” He chuckled and coughed again. Henry urged him to get some rest now and made him promise not to come in tomorrow. “I promise,” he said.</p><p>A day off from work was always welcome even if it was because of illness. They ended the call and Lucas released another deep sigh and turned over onto his side in bed and went to sleep.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>The next morning, Henry left the shop but was startled to find Jo sitting in her car right outside. He swallowed, schooled his features, and approached the passenger side and bent down. She lowered the window and he managed to smile broadly at her.  </p><p>“Detective, I wasn’t aware that you ---”  </p><p>“Get in, Henry,” she curtly demanded.  </p><p>“Ah, in, yes; alright.” He opened the door and did as she had instructed, glancing occasionally at her while he buckled his seatbelt. The car didn’t move, though, and he became more nervous because of the anger he saw on her face and the heavy silence between them. “Jo ---”  </p><p>“Why did you lie to us about those DNA results?” she asked. Point blank. A testament to the true detective that she was.  </p><p>He pursed his lips and then relaxed them, letting out a shaky breath as well. “The results were too strange, too unfathomable,” he replied, keeping his eyes focused in front of him. “The presence of those antibodies from ancient diseases could only mean that the suspect is just as ancient.”  </p><p>“Which is utterly impossible,” she said. “No living person is that old.”  </p><p>He merely dipped his head deeply a couple of times. “The lab must have simply made a mistake,” he said, hating the lie. “What do you plan to do next?” he asked, dreading her answer.  </p><p>“Try to figure out who the suspect is, naturally,” she replied.  </p><p>“Naturally,” he agreed. “But … how?”  </p><p>“Well, we already have a suspect in mind,” she told him and started up the car. “If his DNA matches up with the results in the Glausser and DeSoto cases ---”  </p><p>“DeSoto!” Henry was alarmed to find out they had identified a suspect already. Adam. “What … how does the DNA tie in with the DeSoto case?” That razor had had only the victim’s blood on it. Hadn’t it?  </p><p>While she drove them to the precinct, she explained about the traces of blood on the razor that hadn’t belonged to the victim. His heart fell. He had tried to hide the razor from her but obviously, the CSU had found it and had it analyzed.  </p><p>“The fingerprints were too smudged to be of any help,” she told him. “But we’re working on that, too.”</p><p>She kept her eyes on the road in front of her but studied him in her peripheral. It dismayed her to see him try to hide his discomfort at hearing what she’d shared with him. It could mean only one thing: he was already aware that the cases might be connected and all this time had remained silent about it. She fought the urge to scream at him, demand of him what he was hiding and why. But she knew that from this point on, her unofficial partner was as much under a cloud of suspicion as their mysterious suspect was. And it hurt. She was going to have to keep a close eye on Henry. Maybe even wind up arresting him for … something, she didn’t know what. She had desperately hoped he was not involved, just mistaken about the results. Now … now, she wasn’t so sure. They arrived at the precinct and she parked and turned off the engine. </p><p>“This, ah, suspect,” Henry began. “Do you have a name?”  </p><p>“No,” she replied, regretting the lie but not as much as feeling it was necessary. She wanted to tell him what Hanson was up to but decided to keep him in the dark until they found out what his chem teacher friend came up with.</p><p>“Mostly just a theory,” she said, hitting him with some of his own words he’d uttered at her and Hanson during the Glausser case earlier that year. Again, he appeared to stiffen and swallow hard but struggle to hide how uncomfortable he was.</p><p>And now there was that innocent-looking smile he was turning to her again, to dazzle her again. To throw her off the track again. But why, Henry, why? </p><p>His behavior while investigating past cases had annoyed her and, at times, disturbed her. This time ... this time it was breaking her heart. But it was a risk to let him know what she and Hanson were up to because … he might try to sabotage …</p><p>Damn! She wished she didn’t have to think that way. But she knew she had no choice but to hide her hand.   </p><p>“Welcome back, by the way,” she told him as she unbuckled her seatbelt and got out of the car. He did likewise, and they walked into the precinct together. “Learn anything new that might be helpful to us in testing blood samples?”  </p><p>“A bit,” he replied with a soft smile. “I prefer the old, tried and true methods. The new methods were a bit too complicated for me.”  </p><p>“Hmmm. I thought you liked complicated,” she smirked.  </p><p>They parted at the elevators when he took one going down to the morgue and she took one going up to the fourth-floor bullpen. When she walked out of the elevator, she double-stepped to catch up with Hanson and they entered the bullpen together. She followed him to his desk and he sat down.  </p><p>“The Doc’s coming back tomorrow, right?” he asked her.  </p><p>“Nope,” she replied. “He’s back today.”  </p><p>Hanson could tell by the look on her face that all of this was getting to her and not just because of her feelings for the ME. It was never any fun to have to mark a friend or colleague as a possible suspect.  </p><p>“Came back early,” he said, frowning. “Think he suspects something?”  </p><p>“It's always hard to tell with Henry,” she replied. “But I don’t think so.”  </p><p>“Good,” he said. “But until we hear from Stan, I think we should try to check out this Farber guy.”</p><p>She nodded in agreement and said she would start by calling the hospital’s Human Resource Department.</p><p>“I’ll run him through CODIS to start,” he said. His desk phone rang and he answered it. He put up a hand to stop Jo from going to her desk while he listened and frowned.  </p><p>“Yeah. Okay. We’re on our way.” He then hung up and looked up Jo. “That was Stan,” he said, a look of astonishment on his face. “His tests are finished but the results are freaking him out.”  </p><p>“Mmmm. Because of the ancient antibodies,” Jo said, nodding.  </p><p>“Not just that,” he told her. “According to Stan, he got the results at what he called an ‘exorbitantly accelerated rate’. He’s never seen anything ‘pop’ like that under his microscope before.”  </p><p>“How odd,” Jo remarked. “Lucas would love to know about this. He’d probably say the suspect sounds like some kind of super-soldier that the government made.”  </p><p>“Except you’re forgetting one thing,” he began. “The blood sample came from that little Farber guy, whose body has been on lockdown for nearly two months. I’m headin’ over there to pick up the results myself. Say, can you …?”  </p><p>She nodded. “I’ll stay here and run Farber through the system.”</p><p>Unbelievable, she thought to herself while she watched Hanson jog out of the bullpen and out to the elevators. Farber with some kind of super-soldier blood? Too bad it apparently hadn’t helped him fight off his present physical ailment. Then the possibility hit her that Farber could be responsible for Julian’s and Xander’s murders. Unbelievable, she told herself. Simply unbelievable. </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>Bellevue in Adams’s room …  </p><p> </p><p>While a male nurse finished the humiliating task (humiliating to Adam, not the nurse) of changing him into a fresh pair of disposable underwear and rolling him onto his back again with a “There you go, buddy”, Adam wished for the millionth time that he could simply die. It no longer mattered to him if anyone witnessed his body vanishing. He just wanted this physical bondage to come to an end! And for the millionth time, he berated himself for having allowed Henry to do this to him. He had been so sure that with all his careful planning that he always had the upper hand in dealing with the younger Immortal. It had never occurred to him that Henry would have prepared himself to fight back in any way he could. And for him to have won --- although temporarily --- was galling to Adam.  </p><p>His thoughts returned to when the two detectives had visited him. Only the woman detective named Jo had spoken to him, though. Jo Martinez. Beautiful. Kind. Sensitive. No wonder the silly young man seemed to care so much for her. It was too bad, he thought, that she would age and be gone in the blink of an eye. He wondered why Henry was willing to have such a predictably sad experience all over again. Hadn’t he learned his lesson with that Abigail woman? Any relationship with a mortal would not last and would not end well.  </p><p>But that other detective. Hanson. Mike Hanson. The lumbering clod had the nerve to photograph my medical chart, he silently huffed. Why? And why was he fishing around in my wastebasket? Adam pondered for only a few moments before realizing that they were looking for evidence. Evidence that might connect him to --- yessss. Evidence that might connect him to a murder ... or two. Or three! He'd laugh out loud if he could but this rigid, unflinching body would not permit him to do so. It was still funny, though, that they thought they could pin any murder on him. No one had ever been able to do that. No judicial authority had ever been able to confine him for very long. He had always managed to escape. These two detectives would learn like all the others had that their efforts to bring him to justice were futile. And if Henry cared for them at all, he’d let them know that. More importantly, he’d let them know that they were putting themselves in harm’s way by trying to pin anything on him.  </p><p>A phlebotomist rolled her cart over to his bed just then and yanked the curtain back. “Good morning, Mr. Farber,” she greeted him.  </p><p>No smile. Not in her words, not on her face. Her words were always nice and flowery but she never smiled. How in the world did she keep her job? he wondered.  </p><p>“Just here to take a little more blood,” she told him. “Be done before you know it,” she promised.  </p><p>That’s what she’d said the last time and the time before that. How he wished that he could voice a complaint to the rest of the staff that the woman didn’t know what the hell she was doing! He braced himself to endure whatever pain she would inflict upon him again in her bumbling efforts to draw blood from him.  </p><p>“This would be so much easier if you could make a fist for me,” she told him again. “Sorry,” she said on her first, failed attempt. She slowly lifted the needle but was careful not to remove it from the puncture in his arm. She pushed the needle back down, missing his vein again, and repeated the process. “Sorry. So sorry. Good thing you can’t cry out,” she whispered. “I might lose my job.” The phlebotomist, Margo, steadied her hand and tried a third time.  </p><p>“Your veins are so thick!” she grumbled, keeping her voice low so her co-workers would not hear. “Sure hope you don’t feel this,” she said, “because it’s turning my stomach.” She pushed the needle harder into his arm and found a vein this time. Both of them were greatly relieved as she finally drew the blood and then withdrew the needle from his arm. When she placed a cotton swab over the puncture and a bandaid over that, Adam suddenly realized what Det. Hanson had retrieved from his wastebasket. Ahhh, a sample of his blood to try to match against … </p><p>Aagghh, he just had to shake off this coma or DIE somehow but he had to get away from these meddlesome mortals!  </p>
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<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Half-Shell Lies Ch 6</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>“Stan says the tests are finished but the results are freaking him out,” Hanson told Jo.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>“Because of the ancient antibodies,” Jo said.   </em>
</p><p><em>“According to Stan, the results came at an ‘exorbitantly accelerated rate’," Hanson clarified, “like he’s never seen before.”</em>  </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV  </p><p> </p><p>When Hanson drove up to the front of the high school, Stan was waiting outside for him. As he parked the car and exited it, he noticed how eager the chem teacher looked.  </p><p>“Here,” Stan said and handed a round metal container half the size of a shoebox to him. Hanson took it from him and Stan asked, “Is this some kind of government-sponsored experiment?” Hanson frowned and shook his head. “Well, I haven’t seen anything like that since I worked to identify the remains of ---” He caught himself, choosing not to finish his statement. “I just hope the men in black don’t show up on my doorstep behind this.” </p><p><br/>“What are ya talkin’?” Hanson asked. “I told you; this has to do with a murder case.”  </p><p>Stan eyed the box again skeptically and shook his head. “I’ve seen lots of normal antibodies form from DNA. But not these; and they produced so quickly.”  </p><p>“You’re tryin’a say this ain’t from a human?” Hanson asked.  </p><p>“Oh, no, it’s human,” Stan quickly replied then dropped his eyes back down to the container he held. ”Only it’s unlike any other human DNA I’ve ever seen.”   </p><p>Hanson frowned and looked down at the container, too. “Yeah, I know. Weird.”  </p><p>“Not just weird, Mike!” Stan burst out unable to hide his excitement. “You see, antibodies are just proteins that the body makes when an infection occurs. They then attach to a virus which helps eliminate it. It takes a while to ‘cook’ these antibodies, for want of a better word; but these manifested so quickly and then … I don’t know how to describe it.”  </p><p>“What exactly are you saying?” Hanson asked, his brow knitted.  </p><p>Stan scoffed before replying. “It means it would make the person immune to those diseases. Forever.” Hanson frowned, even more confused. “Look, take the flu. People get it and recover and get it again and again. Some people who recovered from Ebola got it again. Malaria can be successfully treated but people still have flareups. That's because the antibodies fade away or weaken over time.” He pointed a shaky finger at the container in Hanson’s hands. “Not these. At first, I thought how lucky this person must be but … no … I don’t think I’d like to live forever.”  </p><p>Hanson fought off the urge to roll his eyes and instead shook hands with Stan and thanked him.  </p><p>“You’re welcome and … next time you need help with something like this,” Stan said with a wide grin, “don’t hesitate to call.”  </p><p>Hanson walked away and got into his car. Stan scurried back into the building and Hanson, still skeptical, started up the car and pulled away from the curb. As he drove, he glanced down at the container on the passenger side seat and joked, “So, you’ve got some ‘Forever’ stuff goin’ on in there.” He attempted a small laugh but his heart wasn’t in it.   </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>Back at the precinct, Hanson stood by Jo’s desk while they both stared at the results on her computer screen. She had scanned in the images of Farber’s medical chart and they studied them against the information they had on their elusive killer. They were astonished to find that not only had CODIS matched the strange DNA to both the DeSoto and Glausser murders but also to at least three other cold cases spanning nearly two decades beginning in 1996.  </p><p>“In 1996. Mark Cisneros, P.I., found in the trunk of his car with his throat cut,” Jo read, keeping her voice low. “Bennie Burke, his partner, found murdered the same way two months later.”  </p><p>“Bennie must have known somethin’ was up and ran,” Hanson cynically speculated. “Didn’t do him any good, though.”  </p><p>“It’s a given that these guys were killed for the same reason,” Jo said.  </p><p>Hanson nodded in agreement. “To keep ‘em quiet. But keep ‘em quiet about what?”  </p><p>“Look,” Jo said, pointing at the screen. “A building superintendent, Marcie Cornell, in 2007. Her body was found in the same condition as Julian’s and Xander’s, tied to a kitchen chair.” She grimaced and leaned back from the screen. “Sounds strange; almost like these were … hits instead of a serial killer getting his thrills.”  </p><p>“Well, we know for a fact that DeSoto was killed for that pugio,” Hanson said.  </p><p>“And Julian, most likely, was killed because he had tried to sell those artifacts,” Jo added. “Our killer kills for a reason, not necessarily for the thrill alone.” She clucked her tongue and continued. “Well, at least if we solve the two most recent killings, we can put an end to it all.”  </p><p>Hanson placed a hand atop the container that held the shallow, transparent, lidded Petri dish with the cells grown from Farber’s DNA. “I think we just solved ‘em, Jo.”  </p><p>“That quiet little man just doesn’t look like a murderer,” she said.  </p><p>“Well, this proves that he is,” Hanson flatly replied.  </p><p>They had decided to take the bloodied cotton swab stuck to the bandaid to the Lab. “Let them do their thing and, if Stan was right, we won’t have to wait two weeks for the results.”  </p><p>“They have a backlog, though,” Jo said. “How do we beat that?”  </p><p>“New evidence in a couple of cold cases that point to a serial killer,” Hanson began, “gets bumped up to the front of the line.”  </p><p>“Gives new meaning to the journalism phrase ‘If it bleeds, it leads’,” Jo dryly remarked. “But Henry couldn’t have known about Farber,” she said.  </p><p>Hanson sighed and pressed his lips together. “Then … why did he lie, Jo?”  </p><p>Jo closed her eyes and bowed her head slightly as she touched the fingers of one hand to her forehead. Was it really possible that Henry had known all along about Farber? Her heart sank at the thought that he would protect someone responsible for such heinous crimes. If he had … he must have had a good reason, she told herself. It had to be a damn good reason! Her heartbreak eased somewhat when she heard Hanson state that they sit tight and wait for the results from the Lab. A couple of days, he speculated.  </p><p>“In the meantime,” he began, “we tell the Doc nothing.” He hesitated before adding, “Wouldn’t hurt for you to keep an eye on him, though.”  </p><p>“I suppose I kiss him on the cheek when we’re ready to lower the boom,” she said sarcastically.  </p><p>“I don’t like it, either, Jo,” Hanson said. “We gotta keep him under surveillance just like in any other investigation.”  </p><p>“This isn’t any other investigation!” she blurted out. “This is Henry, we’re talking about!” She was upset but knew enough to keep her voice lowered.  </p><p>“Jo, I know you got feelings for the guy, but … we still do what we gotta do,” Hanson told her.  </p><p>She bit her lower lip and nodded, knowing that he was right. “Guess we can wait to put the clinch on Farber, too,” she said. “I mean, it’s not like he’s going anywhere soon.”  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>Abe’s Antiques just before closing …  </p><p> </p><p>Stan Worth walked into the shop, exchanged greetings with Abe, and quickly made his way up to the retail counter.  </p><p>“It finally came in,” Abe happily told him and produced an antique glass chess set from under the counter. He set the case down on the countertop and opened it, displaying the chess pieces and glass board inside of it. While Stan looked it over, Abe said, “Took forever, but … here it is,” fanning his hand over it in a flourish.  </p><p>Stan smiled appreciatively as he gingerly touched the two queens and then the black knight. “Beautiful,” he whispered, wide-eyed. "Like cut diamonds." He straightened up and closed the case. “What’s the damage?” he joked.  </p><p>“Same as we agreed,” Abe replied.  </p><p>Stan ran a hand over his thinning, short, blonde hair and then nodded, pulling his wallet out of his inside coat pocket. “Okay, $2,200.” He counted the bills out onto the counter and while Abe gathered them up and wrote out a receipt, Stan began to tell him about his recent foray into forensic science.  </p><p>“Maybe after this,” he began, “I might one day even help your roommate on a case.” He chuckled happily at the possibility.  </p><p>“Well, Henry’s not an investigator,” Abe clarified. “He just sometimes gets drawn into the NYPD’s investigations because there’s so much knowledge in that head of his,” he jokingly added.  </p><p>While Stan gleefully boasted about the odd DNA he’d tested for Hanson, Abe listened; his smile becoming more and more disingenuous, more and more plastered on his face. He’d heard the story from his father, recalled hearing Lucas’ concerns, and knew that the cat was further out of the bag than either of them had realized.  </p><p>“That, uh, sounds pretty exciting,” he managed to say as he quickly grabbed the keys to the shop’s door and motioned towards it. Stan understood and walked ahead of him with the chess set cradled in his arms. Once Stan was safely outside, Abe locked the door. He hesitated, though, when he saw his father get out of a taxi and have his path to the shop obstructed by the exuberant chem teacher. As Abe watched them engage in conversation, he knew that the ME’s polite smile hid his growing alarm. Abe decided to step in and save the day. He unlocked the door and swung it open.  </p><p>“Hey, Stan, ease up on Henry,” he jokingly said. “Let the poor man come inside and get his dinner.”  </p><p>That did the trick, for Stan finally got into his car and drove away with his purchase. Henry, released from the troubling conversation, let out a deep sigh and thanked Abe heartily as he stepped inside the shop. Abe closed the door and locked it, then followed him up the stairs and into the kitchen. There, they ate the rest of the meatloaf dinner from two days before and discussed the situation that Henry clearly did not seem to have a handle on.  </p><p>“If you’ve got anything up your sleeves, Pops,” Abe quietly but firmly said, “now is the time to pull it out. This is a little different from when you went off to take care of Adam,” he continued. “Only you and I knew about that. But … this thing … it might as well be on the front page of the NYPD Times.” </p><p>Henry laughed softly in spite of himself. “Abe.” After a few moments, he pushed his plate aside, slowly leaned forward, and clasped his hands all the while boring his eyes into his son’s. Almost apologetically, he said, “That evidence must be destroyed. It’s the only way to keep them from finding out the truth about Adam --- and me --- and you.”  </p><p>Abe mimicked his father’s posturing and asked, “And just how do you plan to do that?”  </p><p>“Simple,” his father replied. “The evidence will be in the lab for re-testing since by now the cases have been reclassified as involving a serial killer. It should be easy to get to.”  </p><p>“What about what Stan tested for Hanson?” Abe asked.  </p><p>“It sounds as though your friend, Mr. Worth, may have performed those tests illegally,” he noted. “Quite a clever move on Hanson’s part, I must admit; however, without the actual evidence, it will be completely useless to them.”  </p><p>Abe whistled and raised his eyebrows. “If Jo ever found out, she’d shoot you.”  </p><p>“And she’d be totally justified,” Henry admitted.  </p><p>“And totally surprised,” Abe dryly remarked. </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV</p><p> </p><p>Notes:</p><p> </p><p>Information on antibodies found on several different sites on the Internet including this one: <a href="https://patient.info/allergies-blood-immune/antibody-and-antigen-tests">https://patient.info/allergies-blood-immune/antibody-and-antigen-tests</a></p><p>Thank you for your patience. I had a bit of writer's block with this chapter and the loss of a loved one after a long illness coupled with my own trip to the ER this past Sunday effectively cut into my creativity. Life happens to all of us, though, and we're left here to keep moving on. All that being said, I hope you all appreciate the trouble that Henry has been written into (grinning). My fault, I know. We'll see if he can pull it off (Git ready, boots --- I mean fingers --- start typin'!).</p>
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<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Half-Shell Lies Ch 7 A Slip of the Tongue</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Henry tries unsuccessfully to snatch the evidence from the lab and Jo threatens to arrest him if he tries to sabotage the case. And he inadvertently explains part of the reason for his strange behavior.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It had briefly crossed Jo’s mind to visit Farber again --- briefly. For the man obviously had no way to respond to her questions, so her time would be better spent keeping an eye on Henry, she concluded. To that end just ten minutes ago, she had suggested they have dinner, her treat, but he had asked her for a rain check. He hadn’t even offered a lie, just a quick, polite refusal, and a thank you. After he’d hung up, she’d experienced an unexpected pang of rejection. Just a twinge but it was undeniably there. She managed to brush it aside as she jumped up from the paper chaos on her desk that only she knew how to deal with and walked over to the coffee pot for a third refill.   </p><p>An odd feeling of <em> Déjà vu </em> washed over her as she found herself once again trying to stay mentally one step ahead of Henry during a murder investigation. But her instincts told her to stay at the precinct. Don’t go home, don’t stake him out at the shop. Stay right here at the precinct.  </p><p>After refilling her coffee mug, she carried it back to her desk and eyed the time on the wall clock before taking her seat. As she blew on the hot brew to cool it, she suddenly recalled a few weeks ago when Hanson had proudly shown her a cell phone photo of him and a couple of drinking buddies grinning and hugging a bowling league trophy. He had laughingly pointed Stan out in the photo and informed her that he was single and he could “hook them up”.  </p><p>"<em>That is, whenever </em><em>ya </em><em>get tired of the Doc,”  </em> <em> Hanson had playfully informed her. </em>  </p><p>At the time, she had rolled her eyes and fumed at him as best she could, all the while willing her cheek’s smile muscles not to betray her. Nope. She didn’t want a hook up with Stan for she was nowhere <em>near </em>being tired of Henry. Confused and frustrated by him at times, yes, but not tired. It surprised her at how much her feelings for him had slowly grown.  </p><p>It also crossed her mind that it might upset Henry if he knew about the chem teacher having helped them. Although it pained her to think that way, she tried to put herself in Henry’s shoes and asked herself what he might do next. A dismaying thought occurred to her that he would try to get at the official evidence in the lab. The same way he’d gotten to that darn pugio before she did so he could hide it or give it to someone else or … she still wasn’t quite sure what he had intended to do with it. This whole thing was frustrating as hell but she had to calm down and push her feelings aside. Think like a cop.  </p><p>A glance at the clock again told her that nearly two hours had passed since she’d called Henry. Time enough, she thought, for him to have figured out what his next move was and she had a pretty good idea of what he would do next. She swallowed back her emotions and realized that she had to stop him from doing something stupid. Again.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>Unlike the darkened storage area of the Evidence Lockup, the Forensics Biology DNA lab was as brightly lit inside at half-past midnight as it was at half-past noon. Perhaps because of the white walls, ceilings, testing tables, and white hazmat suits worn by the sparse personnel reflecting the artificial light. </p><p>Ahmi, an overworked technician, fought sleep as he sat at his white-topped workstation and did his best to complete a final report regarding tests on a set of stainless-steel ice tongs suspected to be the weapon in a domestic violence case. His attention was drawn to the sound of the door opening and he welcomed the visitor, any visitor, as a reason to take a brief pause from his work.  </p><p>“Dr. Morgan,” Ahmi said. “All suited up. Sure you’re not sleepwalking?” he teased.  </p><p>Henry forced a polite smile and lowered his head before lifting it back up and replying. “No, no. Wide awake. I came to check on the progress regarding the samples in the DeSoto and Glausser cases.”  </p><p>“Oh, that’s next,” Ahmi informed him. He pointed behind him to a wheeled metal cart resembling a shopping cart in the corner of the lab with taped-up white shipping boxes and labels on them marked boldly with the word EVIDENCE. “More than one case points to a serial killer, most likely,” he added.  </p><p>Henry approached the cart slowly and studied the boxes, wishing he could just light a match to them. The reckless thought immediately abandoned, he felt he should abandon his equally reckless plan, as well. There was no guarantee that he would be able to successfully abscond with the evidence any more than he had with the pugio.  </p><p>“I know you’re anxious to see if the new evidence is connected to those two cold cases,” Ahmi began, “but you’ll just have to wait.” He finished the report and properly packaged everything to go out then left his seat to stand next to Henry. “But if there is a match, it won’t even take the normal two hours to find out.”  </p><p>“Oh? And why is that?” Henry asked.  </p><p>“Because that DNA?” he replied, pointing at the boxes. “I remember it. Took only minutes to get the results. Lots of weird antibodies in it.” He grabbed the large, brown envelope with an Evidence label taped across it and returned to his workstation. “If you don’t mind, Doc, I work better without ---“  </p><p>“--- without someone breathing down your neck,” Henry finished for him. Ahmi nodded and he took that as his cue to make himself scarce. “I’ll leave you to your work, then.”</p><p>With that, although with a heavy heart, he left the lab. He removed the hazmat suit, gloves, plastic hairnet, and shoe coverings, and tossed them into the hazardous waste bin. He then armed into his topcoat and wrapped his scarf around his neck. Just as he opened the outer door and stepped into the hallway, he froze at the sound of a familiar voice.  </p><p>"Fancy meeting you here.” </p><p>He looked slowly up to see a very serious-faced Jo with her arms crossed.</p><p>“I was just, ah, checking on something in the lab,” he awkwardly replied as he closed the door. She could see right through him, he told himself. Along with the anger that darkened her large brown eyes, he saw hurt. His actions were not only angering her but hurting her again. It couldn’t be helped, though. He was trying to protect her.  </p><p>“Do I need to search you?” she asked tiredly, her head tilted to the side. “Because if you’ve taken anything out of there or tampered with any evidence again ---” </p><p>“Don’t be ridiculous, Jo,” he replied, feigning innocence.  </p><p>She dropped her arms and stepped closer to him. “Then, what the <em>hel</em><em>l </em>are you <em>doing </em>here at this hour?” she angrily demanded.  </p><p>He couldn’t answer right away and pulled his lips in instead. “I told you; I was just checking on something. Many’s the night I’ve worked into the wee hours, Detective. My presence here is hardly an aberration.”  </p><p>She stepped even closer to him. “Stay away from this lab, Henry,” she warned him, her voice low and hoarse. “And don’t you dare ef with any of this evidence.”  </p><p>“Jo ---” </p><p>“If you try to screw things up again, I swear I will arrest you,” she continued, still in a hoarse whisper. “Understood?” she asked in a stronger voice, one eyebrow raised.  </p><p>“Understood,” he glumly replied.  </p><p>She appeared to soften a bit although she lowered her eyes and stepped aside, motioning toward the elevator. “C’mon. I’ll run you over to the shop.”  </p><p>He thanked her but they moved in sad silence as they rode the elevator down and exited the building. Once inside her car, the silence hung between them like a slice of winter cold; and they both wondered to themselves how things had gotten to this point after all the drinks, dinners, laughter, and tears they had shared over the past several months. Especially after they’d both begun to imagine cultivating something more meaningful between them.  </p><p>After they arrived at the shop, Jo parked and they sat there in more silence for a few moments. Henry finally cleared his throat and undid his seat belt. He thanked her again but instead of replying, she let out a protracted yawn that ended in a sharp squeak.  </p><p>“Oh. Excuse me,” she pleaded, shaking her head. “Been a long day.”  </p><p>“I think it would be best if you didn’t try to drive yourself home,” he told her. “It’s okay; you should spend the night.”  </p><p>She yawned a second time and shook her head again. “Well, I hate to be a bother.” She smiled sleepily at him. “But I think you’re right.”  </p><p>“Of course, I’m right and it’s no bother at all,” he happily replied.  </p><p>A little more than ten minutes later, Henry sat on the coffee table and watched her sleep as she lay on the couch in the sitting area. He chuckled softly, not wishing to disturb her. Just half an hour ago, she was angrily threatening to arrest him and now she was asleep on his couch again looking like an angel. He took in a deep breath and slowly released it, awed by her beauty and wondering just when she had stolen his heart. She stirred a bit as she nestled her head into the plush pillow and snuggled under the warm comforter. As she stilled again and quietly slumbered, her earlier words came back to him.  </p><p><em> “Why did you lie to us about those DNA results?”  </em> </p><p><em>“No living person is that old.”</em> </p><p>“Jo … I sincerely wish that I could tell you the truth about that DNA,” he quietly told her as she slumbered. “It doesn’t matter if you’d believe me or not. That, yes, there is a living person as old as those ancient antibodies. To explain it all to you would put you in so much danger. And I can’t risk that.” He reached over and lifted a strand of hair that had fallen across her cheek with his finger and smoothed it back behind her ear.  </p><p>“I care too much for you, Jo, to put you in danger of being harmed by Adam. He could shake off his coma any day. The blasted psycho has a way of finding things out about me and about the people important to me. If he ever found out that I had told you about his secret ...” He shuddered at the thought and stood up, unable to voice any more of his fears about Adam. “Sleep tight, my dear.”  </p><p>Only half asleep, Jo felt his fingers brush against her shoulder and her cheek as he tucked the comforter closer around her before he left the room. She heard him click off the light and she felt it safe to open her eyes. She frowned and wondered just what the hell kind of nonsense had he been talking about! </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV </p><p> </p><p>Information about forensic labs found on the Internet. </p>
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<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Half-Shell Lies Ch 8</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Sorry for the wait but this chapter went through several rewrites. Not sure I'm totally satisfied with it but here it is. I sincerely hope you like it.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>VVVVVVVV</p><p> </p><p>The sounds of voices along with the most delightful aromas drifted in from the kitchen and awakened Jo where she lay on the couch. It took her a few moments to become fully awake and remember where she was. It took a few more moments for her to remember some of what Henry had said to her last night while she had drifted off to sleep. When she threw the comforter back and sat up, a smiling Henry walked in with his hands in his pockets.  </p><p>“I know. I look a mess,” she chuckled, smoothing her hair and wrinkled clothing down.  </p><p>He stepped closer to her, still smiling, and said, “Well, the loveliest mess I’ve ever seen.” Anticipating her need, he said, “There are fresh towels in the guest room’s bath.”  </p><p>She smiled (loving the way he said “bawth” making it sound statelier than it really was) and thanked him and went into the guest room at the end of the hallway. It was her first time being in there. Although neatly furnished in cherrywood with a full-size poster bed, a chair, nightstand, and a dresser, it was also clearly being used for storage. There were several cardboard moving boxes on the floor along the wall near the window and in the closet on the floor and on the overhead shelf. Some of the boxes had been opened and the lids folded back down but others were still taped up with mailing stickers still on them. All of the boxes that she could see were addressed to Abe Morgan. Up until now, she had only assumed that Abe’s last name was also Morgan.  </p><p><em> “Just call me Abe. Everyone does.”  </em> </p><p>That’s what he’d told her when they’d first met last year. So, he was definitely related to Henry somehow even though the two of them had hemmed and hawed over exactly how when she’d once pressed them over dinner last year. And he was an antiques dealer so this must be some of the items he’d purchased over the years that couldn’t fit into the shop’s retail space. Something caught her eye on one of the boxes and she bent down again for a closer inspection. The name on the label’s return address was H. Morgan from Antwerp, Belgium with a postmark of July 1988.  </p><p>“Must have been from Henry’s father,” she murmured to herself.   </p><p>Several of the other boxes were from H. Morgan, as well, from Zurich, Switzerland postmarked 1995 and Sao Paolo, Brazil postmarked 2008. They traveled a lot, she concluded. Which is why Henry had learned so many languages while growing up. Just as she decided to stop snooping around their “mail”, some of Henry’s words from last night came back to her.  </p><p><em> “I care too much for you, Jo.”  </em> </p><p>It was the way he had said he cared, had caressed her name so softly with his dulcet tones that had touched her heart, and warmed her from the inside. It had taken all her effort not to react to his gentle touch when he’d tucked the comforter around her. She found herself now wishing to feel the gentle touch of his hand again. And again. And again. She playfully slapped herself on both cheeks and ducked into the bathroom. After she undressed and stepped into the shower, she chuckled at having found the NYPD track suit folded up next to the towels they had provided for her. Did he have a collection of those things? After so many arrests for public nudity, one would think he’d want to burn them or rip them up and use them for cleaning rags instead of saving them.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>In another part of the city, Lucas had also awakened, grateful that his fever had broken. Although he still felt weak, he was thankful his appetite was back and a stack of hotcakes sounded really good. But he’d promised his mother during their phone conversation the night before that he would start out with juice and toast. Juice and toast, then. He also appreciated that Henry had called and offered to come check up on him which he’d politely declined. Even Jo had called and Mike had sent well wishes in the form of a joking threat that if he didn’t hurry up and get back to work, he would break into his locker and steal all of his snacks to give to his kids.  </p><p><em> “Stay away from my stash!”  </em> </p><p><em> “If  </em> <em> you‘</em><em>re not back in a week, all those chips and jelly beans go to my boys!” </em>  </p><p>And he really appreciated Abe having brought over some homemade chicken soup yesterday afternoon. That would be lunch and dinner.  </p><p>The toast went down well with the juice. He flicked on the TV and scrolled through the channels finally selecting a reality show that explored the possibility that descendants of survivors of the bubonic plague had also survived the 1918 flu pandemic. The discussion brought to mind the uncomfortable situation Henry must now be finding himself in. He lowered the volume and dispiritedly plunked the remote on the coffee table and wracked his brain as to how he could help his boss even though Abe had assured him that he had nothing to worry about. He sat forward and rested his forehead against his clasped hands.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>“Sure you won’t stay and have breakfast with us?” Abe asked Jo.  </p><p>“Everything looks scrumptious,” she replied. “But I have to go home and change into some regular clothes.” The two men said nothing but grinned knowingly for even though she’d rolled up the cuffs on the arms and the legs, the men’s size large suit still draped on her smaller frame.  </p><p>“You, um, like these tracksuits, huh?” she playfully asked Henry.  </p><p>He appeared caught off guard at first, the same as when she had asked how he and Abe were connected to each other. “They … serve a purpose,” he managed to reply. A haunted look in his eyes quickly came and went and he flashed a dazzling smile at her as he stood up. “I’ll see you out.”  </p><p>When they reached the shop’s entrance, she watched him unlock the door and open it for her while she fought back the urge to question him about what he’d said to her the night before. He’d said he cared for her; that was nice. More than nice. But he was worried about keeping her safe from someone named Adam. It sounded like this Adam was in a coma but who was he and where was he? What were the odds, she mused, that Henry would know two different people who were both in comas?  </p><p>“See you later,” she told him and walked away and got into her car. She quickly drove away determined to get properly attired and over to the precinct to update Mike and to try to find out who this Adam was.  </p><p>Henry locked the shop’s door again and watched her car disappear down the street. He then returned to the kitchen.  </p><p>“Why didn’t you ride to work with Jo?” Abe asked.  </p><p>“I’m not up to another round of her probing questions,” his father replied. “Besides, she’s not going straight to work. I’ll take a cab.”  </p><p>“Have you ever thought, Dad, that’s it’s probably better that you just tell her the truth?” It was less a question but more Abe’s sound advice. “I mean, she had you pegged when you tried to break into the crime lab and steal that evidence. Your way doesn’t seem to be working.”  </p><p>Henry’s hand closed into a fist on the table. “It would seem that they are moving closer to the truth about Adam on their own, therefore, endangering their lives. If I come clean with them, it would only hasten them to their probable demise.”  </p><p>“He’s stuck in a coma, Dad,” Abe pointed out. “Who knows when he’ll wake up again.”  </p><p>Henry, frustrated, sharply replied, “I am aware of that, Abraham.”  </p><p>“It could be years, decades before he wakes up,” Abe continued. “Wouldn’t it be better if the authorities carted him off somewhere more secure to keep him away from all of us? We’ll be gone by then ---”  </p><p>“Abraham!”  </p><p>“No, Dad, <em> we </em>don’t get to live forever,” he rationalized. “You and he will have to duke it out after we’re all gone. Instead of trying to thwart them, help them put him away somewhere. Someplace where he can’t do anybody any harm even if he dies and vanishes.”  </p><p>Father and son exchanged a long, tense stare as if both were silently willing the other to see the situation their way. Henry ended the stare down and left the table to put on his outer coat and scarf. Abe left his seat and walked over to where he was poised at the top of the stairs.  </p><p>“At least give it some real thought,” Abe urged his father, his hand on his arm.  </p><p>“I will,” he replied and patted his son’s hand. “I promise.”  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>“So, ya think this Adam that Henry referred to is in cahoots with Farber?” Hanson asked as he stood next to Jo’s desk.  </p><p>“I’m willing to bet on it,” she replied. “Henry also called him a ‘blasted psycho’ so that might be why he’s been trying to hide all of this from us. Just wish we had a last name for this psycho.”  </p><p>“Bellevue seems to be ground zero for crankin’ out psychos that <em>we </em>wind up dealin’ with,“ he carped. “Look, we get the results from the lab and we put the cuffs on Farber. Then we look for this Adam guy.”  </p><p>“Without a last name,” she began, “how would we do that?”  </p><p>“Farber’s a clam so we’ll have to get it from Henry,” he replied.  </p><p>“And if he doesn’t cooperate?” she asked, knowing full well what the answer was.  </p><p>“We treat him like any other material witness who’s withholding information.” He frowned at her and sighed. “Sorry, Jo; we both know that’s the way it’s gotta be.”  </p><p>Hanson’s desk phone rang and he quickly went over and answered it. “Okay, thanks. Be right down.” He hung up and looked at her. “I’m going down to fetch the results. Be back in a few.”  </p><p>She bit her lower lip and nodded. Usually, once a suspect had been identified and the case was near a close, she felt a great sense of satisfaction, of mission accomplished. But she didn’t feel that this time for this case was different. Loose ends had to be tied up and Henry was one of them. At least, what he knew about Farber was. She was equally curious about what Henry could tell them about the “blasted psycho” that had to be this Adam guy. Then, she also recalled with a cynical laugh that Henry had said there was a living person old enough to carry those antibodies in their blood. Was he talking about Adam? That was utterly impossible, she told herself. He simply must have meant something else or she had been too sleepy to understand everything he had said to her in that moment.  </p><p>The elevator dinged and she heard footsteps. She looked toward the entrance of the bullpen expecting to see Mike but Henry walked in instead. He was impeccably dressed, as usual, in a well-tailored, dark suit and tie with a maroon shirt. For just a second, he paused as if gathering his courage, and walked up to her desk and bid her good morning but by the look on his face, she could tell that it definitely was not.  </p><p>“Hey, Henry,” she replied. “You look like you just lost your best friend.” Her attempt at humor fell flat and was met with silence. Concerned, she quickly stood up and walked around her desk to face him. “Henry, what’s wrong?”  </p><p>He swallowed and lowered his head but maintained eye contact with her. “I …" His demeanor suddenly changed as if a difficult decision had just been reached and he lifted his head and squared his shoulders. “I must speak to you urgently about the DeSoto and Glausser murder cases.”  </p><p>“Alright, um, let’s go into the conference room right here,” she told him. The hope that he would finally reveal to her what he’d been hiding, warred with the dread she also felt. </p><p><em>'Please, Henry, don’t tell me anything that would make me have to arrest you.'  </em> </p><p>“I warn you, Detective,” he began, “This will not be a routine sharing of my observations regarding these two cases.” He looked over at Hanson’s empty desk and then around the room and back at her. “Where is Det. Hanson? He should hear this, too.”  </p><p>“He should be back any minute,” she told him as they entered the conference room and she shut the door. “He’s picking up evidence from the lab we think will connect your former therapist, Dr. Farber, to not only those two murders but at least three others. I’m sorry.”  </p><p>A shuddering sigh left his lips and he shook his head. “No. It is I who should be apologizing to the two of you,” he said. “Not only for lying months ago about the DNA results in the Glausser case but also for hiding the truth from you about Farber … and about me. But believe me, I was only trying to protect you.”  </p><p>Just then, Hanson entered the bullpen and finding Jo’s empty desk, he looked around, spotted her with Henry in the glass-enclosed conference room, and quickly joined them.  </p><p>“Mornin’, Doc,” he said with a wave of the file in his hand. He then plopped it down in front of Jo. “It’s a match. That strange DNA belongs to Farber.” The lines on his forehead creased as he looked from one to the other of his not-so-happy colleagues. He sat down on the other side of Jo and said, “I wasn’t exactly expecting applause but I don’t understand why you two aren’t just a little happier at having got the goods on a serial killer.”  </p><p>“Henry has some additional information to share,” she replied to him but kept her eyes on Henry.   </p><p>“Okay,” he said, shrugging. “Spill it, Doc.”  </p><p>“I’m sure you’ve both speculated about how those antibodies from ancient diseases wound up in Adam’s blood,” Henry stated. “It’s because he was living at the time those diseases ravaged the world’s population.”  </p><p>“Whoa, whoa, wait a minute, Doc,” Hanson said. “You’re talkin’ about Adam. This new evidence was taken from Farber’s blood. And what ya just said sounds crazy, by the way.”  </p><p>“Farber is Adam,” he replied. “Or, rather, Adam is Farber.” He released a sigh of apprehension mixed with relief. Apprehension because he was prepared for them to not believe him and think that he was still lying or had gone completely mad. Relief because he was finally, finally telling them the truth.  </p><p>“Henry … you’re saying that this man has been alive for, for centuries?” Jo asked, incredulous. “You do know how crazy that sounds.”  </p><p>“Yes, Detective,” he replied. “I know exactly how crazy it sounds. But it’s the truth and … I can prove it.”  </p><p>Hanson guffawed. “My Grandfather Ignacio is 100. He’s old and wrinkled and white-haired. Doc, people who make it to his age are lucky. But they don’t usually live too many years beyond 100!”  </p><p>“I was afraid that you wouldn’t believe me,” Henry said, more to himself. “But as I said … I can prove it,” he told them more confidently.  </p><p>Hanson eyed him skeptically for a moment or two and then released a sigh. “Doc, we got a collar to make. Whatever malarkey this is you’re tryin’a lay on us ---”   </p><p>“Prove it how?” Jo asked, interrupting Hanson.  </p><p>“Jo ---” Hanson’s cell phone buzzed and he rolled his eyes and answered it. “Hanson … Yeah, we’re on our way over there now … What, ya mean he’s dyin’? …  No. We’re on our way!” He ended the call and muttered a curse. “Just when we got him cornered. C’mon, Jo, let’s get over to Bellevue ASAP.”  </p><p>“What did they tell you, Detective?” Henry asked with a squinty, sideways penetrating stare.  </p><p>“Farber may not make it,” Hanson replied.  </p><p>“You coming?” Jo asked Henry.  </p><p>“No,” he replied. “I’m sure that the hospital’s medical staff is enough to attend to him and neither you nor Hanson need any help from me to take him into custody.”  </p><p>Jo eyed him suspiciously but hurried into the elevator with Hanson. Once the doors closed, he hurried over as well and punched the down call button. He had to get to the river just in case the twisted Immortal died and he resurfaced there. When the elevator doors opened onto the lobby, he rushed outside at the same time a cab pulled up. He wrenched open the back door, jumped inside, and barked his urgent destination to the driver. After he buckled his seatbelt, only then did he notice the presence of another person in the backseat.  </p><p>“Lucas!”  </p><p>“Hey, Big Guy,” he chuckled.  </p><p>“What are you --- why are you in my cab?” Henry asked as the driver hurtled them toward the river.  </p><p>“Uh, well, it was my cab at first,” Lucas explained. “Then you jumped in and commandeered it.”  </p><p>Henry pursed his lips and vigorously shook his head. “And just where did you think you were going?”  </p><p>“To work but now it looks like I’m ... going with you,” he replied. “Where, uh, ever that is.”  </p><p>Henry groaned and palmed his face.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>Bellevue Hospital, Adam’s room …  </p><p> </p><p>Hanson, wide-eyed and speechless, stood next to Jo in the same condition in the middle of Farber’s hospital room. They had just witnessed the medical staff’s unsuccessful attempt to revive Farber after he’d gone into cardiac arrest. Nothing had prepared them for what they’d seen next. Farber had not only flatlined but moments later his body had vanished in a bright flash of white light. The tubes and defibrillator pads lay uselessly on his empty bed, his body’s impression on the pillow and mattress the only indication that he’d ever been there at all.  </p><p>“What just happened here, Jo?” Hanson asked, finally finding his voice. “Did I see what we just saw??” </p><p>Everything was beginning to fall into place now. Admittedly, as unbelievable and as unfathomable as it all was, it wasn’t making much sense. But now she at least understood why Henry had warned her about pursuing the lead of the strange DNA. It had led them to Farber, who, apparently, was also the “blasted psycho” named Adam that he’d said he wanted to protect her from.  </p><p><em> “</em><em>He could shake off his coma any day.” </em>  </p><p>And he apparently had just done that! </p><p><em> “He was living at the time he contracted those ancient diseases.” </em> </p><p>And he apparently <em>has</em> been alive for centuries!  </p><p>Jo concluded that there was nothing more they could do at the hospital. She quickly exited the room with Hanson close behind her, asking again what they should do. As they left the building and piled into her car, her instincts told her to contact Henry. But knowing that he didn’t carry a cell phone, she called Abe and hit the speaker button. She was sure that he could provide some answers to this madness.  </p><p>
  <em>(“Abe’s Antiques; how may I help you?”) </em>
</p><p>“Hi, Abe. This is Jo. You can help me by telling me why Adam’s body vanished after he just died in front of us,” she said, getting right to the point.  </p><p>
  <em>(“Did you say ‘us’? Oh … Geez.”)  </em>
</p><p>“I want the truth, Abe,” she told him. “And I know that you know what that is.”  </p><p>There was a long silence before he replied.  </p><p><em>(“Then, I suggest you send the nearest squad car to the East River,” Abe quietly and reluctantly advised. “A psycho like him should be recaptured immediately.”)</em>  </p><p>“The East River? Why?” Hanson demanded, confused.  </p><p>Jo stared incredulously at her phone but … she believed him. She didn’t know why she believed anything so crazy but she did.  </p><p>“Make the call,” she told Hanson. He hesitated, uncertain. “Mike, just do it!”  </p><p>He shook his head but did as Abe and she had advised. He provided Farber’s description and that he was suspected of being in the vicinity of the East River Park. They closed in themselves on the location and were simultaneously joined by a patrol car. The responding police exited their car. She and Hanson were surprised to see Lucas standing near the river’s edge just beyond the park. What surprised them more was the sight of a drenched Henry (but, thankfully, clothed in a shirt and trousers) emerging from the river with a naked, angry, and struggling Farber (Adam?). The unis quickly took charge of the naked man.   </p><p>“What the hell?” Jo whispered.  </p><p>She and Hanson jumped out of the car and ran up to the drenched ME and his assistant, who probably should have still been at home recuperating. They stared, astonished, at the dripping wet recently-deceased man as the unis cuffed him and shoved him into the back of their patrol car. Before they closed the door, he leveled the coldest, darkest glare at Henry and warned him.  </p><p>“You’d better warn your friends, Henry,” he sneered. “Tell them how much trouble their foolish meddling has now brought them.”  </p><p>One of the unis then closed the door and informed them that they were taking him to Manhattan South. They then sped away with him.  </p><p>“Wait … how … how is that guy still alive?” Hanson asked, total confusion on his face.  </p><p>“Henry can explain,” Jo said matter-of-factly, staring him down. “Can’t you, Henry?” </p>
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<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Half-Shell Lies Ch 9</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p><em> “How is that guy still alive?” Hanson asked, totally confused.  </em> </p><p> </p><p><em> “Henry can explain,” Jo said, staring him down. “Can’t you, Henry?” </em> </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV  </p><p> </p><p>Henry eyed the squad car as it wheeled away with Adam in it. “I can," he replied while shoving his feet into his expensive shoes and the socks into his pockets. "But I also think we should not let Adam out of our sight." He then began jogging toward Jo’s car.</p><p>The others, including Lucas, followed him and they all piled in. Jo gunned the engine and caught up with the squad car.  </p><p>“And to answer your question, Det. Hanson,” he began, breathless after his short run and struggle in the water with Adam, “what you saw in his hospital room is what always occurs when he dies. He returns to life, naked, in a large body of water that happens to be nearest him.”  </p><p>“You’ve seen this before??” Hanson asked.  </p><p>“Yes,” he replied reluctantly as he recalled when he had witnessed the troubled Immortal deliberately take his own life twice. “If ever he gets a moment alone,” he cautioned them, “it may happen again. A most brutal but highly effective form of escape.” He knew all too well of that from more than one escape-by-death card he’d played over the past two centuries.  </p><p>“You knew exactly where he would be,” Lucas said still spellbound, his eyes roaming over Henry’s face. “Same spot almost where you … uh …” His voice trailed off but the look of wonder remained on his face. Then he chuckled nervously. “You, you must h-have seen him there when you were, uh, skinny dipping,” he reasoned.   </p><p>“No, Lucas,” Henry replied, lowering his eyes. Here it was. The moment for him to reveal his secret to them. He sincerely hoped with all his heart that they would understand what he was to say next and why he had kept it hidden for so long. “I have never seen Adam in or near the river whenever I’ve … reawakened there myself.”  </p><p>His eyes traveled between the three of his companions as he assessed their reactions. They arrived at the Manhattan South precinct but he remained in the car with Lucas as Jo and Mike hurriedly exited the car.  </p><p>“I’ll wait for you guys here, if you don’t mind,” Lucas told them. “Still a little … shaky,” he added apologetically. Shaky from recuperating but also from having just witnessed his mild-mannered boss dive into the murky river and drag a struggling, naked, apparent psycho out of it; and from what Henry had told them during the short drive from the river to the precinct.   </p><p>“I shall do likewise,” Henry told them sheepishly. “My water-drenched appearance in there again may hinder your progress in taking custody of Adam.”  </p><p>The two detectives nodded mutely and entered the building, focusing on the task at hand instead of the fact that their world had just been turned on its ear after Henry’s fantastic claims of not only Farber/Adam being an Immortal but he, himself, as well! Jo and Hanson, however, both knew that any further questions for Henry had to be tabled for now. They had to get inside and make sure that the strange, resurrected prisoner didn’t take the “easy” way out and escape. They flashed their badges and ID’d themselves to the desk sergeant.  </p><p>“From Lt. Reece’s squad,” Sgt. Hastings noted. “How may I help you, Detectives?”  </p><p>“The prisoner that was just brought in,” Jo replied, fighting to keep her voice calm.  </p><p>“The other skinny dipper,” Hastings smirked. “We’ve gotten him in here a few times before but not as often as your ME, Dr. Morgan.”   </p><p>“Listen, Laughin’ Jack,” Hanson interrupted. “He’s also a POI in a string of cold case murders and we want him remanded to our custody after he’s booked.”  </p><p>Hastings wiped the smirk off of his face and replied in a more professional manner. “Murder? Uh, I’ll get right on it, Detective.”  </p><p>“You do that,” Hanson said, irritated. He then hesitantly turned to face Jo. “Sorry, Jo. The guy’s a jerk."  </p><p>The thought of Henry having actually died more than once only to be arrested and hauled in for public nudity by the likes of Hastings and his crew saddened her. If he had only trusted her or someone earlier, he may have been able to avoid all those arrests and public embarrassment.  </p><p>“He’s not as much of a jerk as you and I were,” she sadly admitted. “We teased Henry all the time about that, too.”  </p><p>Hanson pressed his lips together and sighed, hanging his head a bit. “Yeah,” he quietly agreed. “Wouldn’t blame ‘im if he strangled me with those red speedos I gave ‘im last year.”  </p><p>The memory evoked a groan of embarrassment from Jo. “Still --- if that sergeant makes one more crack about Henry, I’ll ---” She abruptly stopped talking when they saw Captain Laurie Hemecker coming toward them.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>Outside the precinct in Jo’s assigned car …  </p><p> </p><p>Henry had seen the guilt in their eyes; but there were no hard feelings. People usually reacted in a condescending or even threatening manner when he’d been caught emerging from the river in his natural state. Some had chosen to either ridicule, shun, or punish him for it. Law enforcement personnel invariably reacted no differently from regular citizens in that regard. But the fact that Jo, Hanson, and Lucas did feel guilty, made him happy. It meant that they believed him; accepted him. But how accepting would they remain after he revealed more of his long story to them? He fixated on the look in Jo’s eyes and he realized that he was more concerned about how accepting she would be.  </p><p>Jo joined them again in the car but she was alone. She informed them that Mike was going to ride along with Adam when he was transported over to their precinct, the 11th. Her phone buzzed and she recognized Abe’s Antiques on the Caller ID.  </p><p>“Martinez.”  </p><p><em> (“What’s the update?” an anxious Abe asked.)  </em> </p><p>“I’ll let you talk to Henry,” she replied and handed the phone to him.  </p><p>“Hello, Abraham … Yes, I’m fine. Everyone’s fine; and Adam is back in custody … Yes, ah, everyone’s taking in the information I shared with them very well.” Henry smiled and nodded. “Alright, see you in a little while.” He bid him goodbye and ended the call, handing the phone back to Jo. He then asked if she could drop him off at the shop so that he could shower and change. </p><p>“Sure, no problem,” she replied. After a few moments, she said, “So, his full name is Abraham.” As she drove, she eyed him in the rearview mirror.  </p><p>“Yes.”  </p><p>“And his last name is Morgan, too,” she stated further.  </p><p>“Yes,” he replied, smiling proudly. He knew where this was going.  </p><p>“And how is he really connected to you?” Jo asked.  </p><p>“May I … wait until you’ve safely parked the car before I respond?” he asked. “The answer may startle you while you’re driving.”  </p><p>“Henry, everything that’s happened today has been startling,” she impatiently responded. “I haven’t crashed yet.”  </p><p>“Alright, then.” He paused to glance at Lucas then said, “Let’s just say that every Father’s Day, he gifts me with a scarf instead of a tie.” </p><p>“He gifts you,” Lucas said while he pointed to his right then at Henry while he worked it out in his head. Then his eyes popped open wide and his jaw dropped. “You’re the Dad, he’s the son!”  </p><p>Henry simply beamed proudly in response. </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>It would take a while for Adam to be processed and then transported over to the 11th. So, while Henry showered and changed into a fresh set of clothes, Jo and Lucas waited in the kitchen. They both eyed Abe as another slice of the miracle pie that Henry Morgan had just popped out of. Lucas tried to question him about his childhood with Henry as a father. Abe, although happy that his Pops had finally come clean with them, was reluctant to give out any answers behind his father’s back.  </p><p>“I will tell you this, though,” Abe said. “Mom was the best Mom. Henry was and still is the best Dad. Best parents any kid could ever have.”  </p><p>Henry had just left his bedroom and was poised in the hallway just outside the kitchen entrance, and beamed proudly when he’d heard Abe’s remarks. God knows that he and Abigail had always tried to do their best for their beloved son. He quickly entered the kitchen and shortly thereafter, Jo, Lucas, and he returned to the precinct.  </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV </p><p> </p><p>Notes: </p><p> </p><p>Sorry. I believe this chapter is a bit short but the next chapter will be devoted mostly to Adam. And I couldn’t resist making the Captain at Manhattan South a Hemecker. But is she related in some way to Pvt. Carl Hemecker, who recognized Henry in the park in the mid-50's? Hmmm, maybe. Maybe not. Think I’ll put that in another fic that’s forming in my mind.  </p><p>The character, Carl Hemecker, appeared briefly in Forever TV show 2014 episode, “The Man in the Killer Suit”, S01/E10.  </p><p>Thank you all for your patience and your continued interest and support. </p>
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<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Half-Shell Lies Ch 10 Can You See Me Now?</h2></a>
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    <p>For the past 15 minutes, a silent Adam had sat across from Jo and Hanson in the 11th Precinct’s Interrogation Room. Occasionally, he lowered his small, brown eyes disinterestedly to the incriminating documentation spread out on the table; at other times he trained them menacingly at the spot where he figured Henry stood on the other side of the two-way glass.  </p><p>Jo put her arm up on the back of her chair and twisted slightly around to gaze in frustration at the same spot. Mike, equally frustrated, leaned back in his chair, wishing to take a different approach since his “Bad Cop” to Jo’s good one had not worked. Even so, he wished he could apply the screws to him. Henry had warned them that they all were probably marked for death, anyway, by this weird little creep so why not get a few licks in before then.  </p><p>During questioning, the unsettling Immortal had neither confirmed nor denied that Farber was an alias or that Adam was merely a moniker he’d adopted in order to mess with Henry’s mind while he’d stalked him from late last year into early this year. Didn’t have a lawyer and didn’t appear to want one; not even a public defender. An amused raise of the eyebrows was the most they’d managed to get out of him when asked if he understood his rights under the Miranda Law.  </p><p>Jo turned back around to face him. “Since you insist on keeping up this mime act, let me tell you what I think,” she said dryly. “You killed a private investigator, Mark Cisneros, in 1996. You slit his throat. Two months later, his partner, Bennie Burke, was found murdered in the exact same way. What happened?” she asked. “Did they start investigating you instead of finding Henry? You killed them when they maybe tried to blackmail you.”  </p><p>At that, his look of self-satisfied superiority darkened and his eyes flashed with anger. The small muscles in his cheeks twitched. But he remained silent.  </p><p>Jo pressed on, seeing that she had finally struck a nerve. “In 2007, a building superintendent in Jackson Heights named Marcie Cornell was found murdered in the same manner that Julian Glasser and Xander DeSoto were. Why did you kill her? Did she get too nosy after witnessing your disappearing act?” And she hoped that Henry didn’t feel insulted by her chacterization of that aspect of his condition.  </p><p>He remained silent but his small, dark eyes widened and his chin jutted out for half a second, telling her that she was on the right track. Heck, she had been bluffing! But it seemed that Henry was right when he’d told them that Adam would do anything to anyone in order to protect his secret. According to Henry, Adam had even killed him in the Frenchman’s basement to prevent Jo from witnessing his death and his body vanishing. Adam, it seemed, was the self-appointed keeper of both their secrets, she concluded. </p><p>“Your DNA turns up in each of these brutal murders,” she continued. “Now, you can sit there and continue to say nothing but the evidence speaks loud and clear enough for any jury to convict you.” She gathered up the documents and placed them back into a brown file folder.  </p><p>“We’re through here,” she told the uni standing guard at the door. The uni moved to take charge of him while she and Mike stood up and began to leave.  </p><p>“You’re making a mistake,” Adam finally said, his voice smooth and clear as cut glass and the cold sharpness of it cut into their sensibilities.  </p><p>“Our precious Henry must have explained to you,” Adam continued, “that these feeble attempts to level your puny, mortal justice against me is futile. Many others have found out, painfully, that in the end,” he added, “I always win.”  </p><p>“Now, he wants to talk,” Mike said, sauntering back towards the smug man. “A real Chatty Kathy.” <br/> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>Behind the glass …  </p><p> </p><p>“He does speak, then,” Reece said to Henry, her arms folded. She kept her eyes on Adam, incensed that the strange man had had the nerve to threaten everyone connected with Henry, including herself. </p><p>“Any thoughts, Henry?” Reece asked while keeping her eyes on her detectives and the suspect.  </p><p>He took in and released a deep breath before responding. “I’m thinking,” he said. “How to make sure Adam doesn’t win this time. To have him out of our lives once and for all.”  </p><p>“Forever?” Reece asked as she side-eyed him. At his startled reaction, she said, “Amazing what a little research uncovers,” she said with a slight smile. “And a little chat with your friends in there,” she added, nodding her head at Jo and Mike. “They’re not the only ones who can be trusted with your secret, Henry,” she told him, turning her head to meet his gaze of surprise.  </p><p>He lowered his head and smiled. “We all are now in unknown territory, Lieutenant,” he replied. “As difficult as it may be for each of you to deal with the learning of my secret, know that I have never shared it with so many in such a short time.”  </p><p>"Unknown territory; you can say that again,” Reece said, shaking her head. “But we’re your friends as well as your colleagues. Your secret’s safe with us, Doctor,” she assured him with great sincerity.  </p><p>They turned their attention back to Jo and Mike questioning the now arrogantly verbose Adam. “I liked him better when he wasn’t sayin’ nuthin’,” Reece jokingly lamented. She sighed. “Any ideas yet on how to effectively deal with him?”  </p><p>“I’m, ah, still working it out in my head,” Henry replied. “But many murder suspects are placed on a suicide watch. Perhaps we can make use of that in his case.”  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>Back in the Interrogation Room …  </p><p> </p><p>Adam once again maintained his silence, seemingly content to have at least warned them of their impending doom. He likened it to having given them a head start. It always made things a little more fun when his opponent or prey believed they had a fighting chance. Of course, they really didn’t; not against him. While the uni hustled him out of the room and back down the corridor to be booked, he was already mapping out his plan of escape. It was simply a matter of when. And afterward, this handful of puny mortals would find out just how mistaken they were to have ever crossed his path.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>Reece stood in the video surveillance room with two guards just outside the area that housed the holding cells, including Adam’s. She watched the heartless Immortal onscreen as he slowly paced the length of his cell, looked up and around, and then directly at the camera with an expression that told her that he had “figured it out”. How to escape. It was just a matter of when.  </p><p>“They’re here, Lieutenant,” one of the guards informed her.  </p><p>She turned around to find a technical crew of three men and two women with a service cart full of surveillance equipment. The guard unlocked the door to the holding area and held it open as they pushed the large cart through. The guard on the other side of the door walked ahead of them down the hallway and stopped outside Adam’s cell. While they worked to set up the extra surveillance equipment and trained it at his cell, Reece watched him onscreen. The smug look on his pale face gradually melted away to anger. He walked toward the bars and stood facing the workers; his cold eyes once again were trained on the original camera as if in silent protest of the extra equipment being added.  </p><p>“Kind of overkill just for one guy, ain’t it, Lieutenant?” the guard asked.  </p><p>“It may be barely enough,” she replied, ignoring the quizzical look on the guard’s face and she certainly hoped that this idea of Henry’s worked. </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV  </p><p> </p><p>Notes:  </p><p> </p><p>Slight reference to Forever TV show 2014 episode “The Problem with Psychopaths” S01/E14. </p>
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<a name="section0011"><h2>11. Half-Shell Lies Ch 11 Adam Agrees?</h2></a>
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    <p><em> “Any ideas yet on how to effectively deal with, what do you call him?  </em> <em> Adam </em> <em> ?” Reece asked Henry.    </em> </p><p><em> “I’m still working it out,” Henry replied. “But many murder suspects are placed on a suicide watch; perhaps that can work for us here.” </em> </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV  </p><p> </p><p>Reece had very verbally shared her hopes with Henry that his idea of having extra surveillance equipment installed in and outside Adam’s cell would work to intimidate him and make him think twice before offing himself in front of so many witnesses. Frankly, she couldn’t see that man being intimidated by anyone or anything let alone an overabundance of electronic monitoring devices. As she left the surveillance room and headed back to her office, she sincerely hoped they could at least manage to keep him contained so that he could face the justice he deserved. But … containing an Immortal was near impossible and a milestone of the strangest kind that she hoped never to have to repeat.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>It was well past the lunch hour, approaching mid-afternoon, and Jo regretted having passed on the delicious breakfast that Abe had cooked that morning. She was surprised that she still had an appetite after having been in such close proximity to Adam.  </p><p>“He frightens me,” Jo admitted to Mike as she shuddered, standing near his desk and remembering to keep her voice lowered.  </p><p>“That makes two of us if it’ll make ya feel any better,” he also admitted. “But I feel braver with him locked up.”  </p><p>Jo chuckled softly then explained further. “It’s not his … condition, as Henry calls it, that frightens me. It’s the way that he thinks. The way that he doesn’t … feel.” She shuddered again; her slight smile now gone. “I just hope that Henry never becomes … emotionally empty like him.” Her eyes, though lowered, darted back and forth in a worried manner.  </p><p>Mike was having none of it. He quickly left his seat and put his face in hers. “Not the Doc,” he adamantly told her. “He’d never get like that creep. Deep down, you know it, too, so get that outta your head right now.”  </p><p>A smile broke out on her face again and she nodded, blinking back tears. “Yeah,” she whispered in response. “I do know.” She smiled more happily at her caring partner coming at her in full big brother mode. “Thanks, Mike.”  </p><p>He straightened up and nervously wriggled his fingers before shoving one hand into his pants pocket and rubbing the back of his neck with the other. “Yeah, well, you’re welcome,” he replied. “No more goofy talk,” he added, pointing a finger at her.  </p><p>“No. No more goofy talk,” she promised him. While she mentally entertained herself with images of a handsome, smiling, and dapperly-dressed Henry from different time periods, Mike asked when Henry was to meet with Adam. “He should be there right now.”  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv </p><p> </p><p>Adam sensed a presence. The familiar, deliberate footfall that approached his cell echoed to him from the abandoned subway platform earlier that year. The footfalls stopped in front of his cell and he opened his eyes. “Hello, Henry,” he said. “How nice of you to visit me again.”  </p><p>The snide sarcasm in the older Immortal’s voice caused Henry to work hard to restrain the anger and disgust in his own as he quietly uttered the man’s name in reply. Adam, likewise, heard the emotions in the younger Immortal’s voice. He sat up on the side of his bunk but stared straight ahead at the opposite wall.  </p><p>“You’ve come to mark my boundaries,” Adam told him. He turned his head slightly to his left to partially view Henry standing on the other side of the bars with his hands clasped behind his back. “Am I right?”  </p><p>Henry raised his eyebrows slightly and blinked a couple of times as he lowered his head and shifted his feet. “You might say that.” He raised his head again and jutted his chin out at him. “I need to explain the need for these many surveillance devices.”  </p><p>Adam turned his head away and stared at the wall again, the smugness on his face replaced by quiet anger. “You, of all people, Henry, should know better than to put me in this situation,” he hissed.  </p><p>“This ... situation ... is the result of your own actions and misdeeds,” Henry replied. “Make no mistake about that,” he hissed back.  </p><p>Adam stood up and turned to face him. “Isn’t it enough that I was imprisoned in my own body for months?!”  </p><p>“Weeks," Henry corrected. "But again, the result of your own misdeeds,” Henry countered.  </p><p>Adam slowly walked closer to stand face to face with Henry. But instead of gripping the bars like a desperate gangster in a 1930’s movie, he kept his arms pinned by his sides. The outer edges of his thumbs, Henry noted, were pressed against the outer seams of his pants in a manner that suggested he’d had military training at some time in his incredibly long life. Not entirely implausible, Henry thought. Perhaps he’d served during a time when he’d held strong convictions and was still “a decent man” as he’d once claimed he had been.  </p><p>“You’re under suicide watch,” Henry informed him.  </p><p>“As if that has ever kept me from seeking my … path to freedom,” Adam smugly shot back with a slight wiggle of his head.  </p><p>“And, I assume that any witnesses would be summarily dealt with,” Henry stated with confidence.  </p><p>“I have always acted only as the situation has demanded,” Adam responded. The pride in his voice and demeanor left Henry sickened.   </p><p>“Well,” Henry began as he raised his eyebrows and glanced over his shoulder at the electronics behind him. “That may have worked for you when there were just a few witnesses.” He stepped back and turned to the side. “What if your so-called path to freedom was broadcast to the entire world?”  </p><p>Adam’s cheek muscles flinched and his lower lip twitched to the side as he seethed with anger while he viewed the equipment with renewed interest. “Surely, you don’t intend …"  </p><p>“Oh, absolutely,” Henry replied, cutting him off. “Imagine the, ah, Times Square jumbotron broadcasting your movements on a 24-hour basis to a constantly-changing throng of hundreds, thousands. Over a period of time, who knows how many millions will have become acquainted with your likeness?”  </p><p>The older Immortal took great exception to the gleeful manner in which the ME spoke and motioned with a flourish toward the equipment as if it was a prize on a game show. Henry turned to face him again, his glee tempered with determination.  </p><p>“And one has to wonder on what other social media platforms you and your day-to-day activities will be viewed; and by whom?” Henry speculated.  </p><p>“You wouldn’t dare!” Adam growled.  </p><p>“Oh, wouldn’t we?” Henry replied, seemingly unmoved in the face of the man’s growing anger. “Imagine how the viewers in the government, for instance, would react to your odd way of escaping. They would leave no stone unturned to find you, Adam. They would subject you to the most painful type of scrutiny in order to find out the secret of how you escaped.”  </p><p>“You’re bluffing!” Adam rasped.  </p><p>Henry stepped aside again. “Take a closer look.”  </p><p>Adam’s eyes widened only slightly when he saw what appeared to be live images of Henry and himself being fed into Times Square on the jumbotron. “Impossible!” he barked. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing. A humongous throng watching him in real-time. He gripped the bars and cast an uncharacteristically troubled gaze at the images. With that infernal equipment installed inside and outside his cell, how could he ever …  </p><p>“Don’t worry,” Henry said. “The audio feed has not been enabled yet.”  </p><p>“What is it you want from me?” Adam asked in a lowered voice.  </p><p>“Take your punishment, Adam,” Henry told him. “Would it not be better to remain imprisoned for now, rather than become a permanent guest of some government’s medical testing facility?”  </p><p>“That can only work for so long and you know it,” he reminded Henry in a raspy, angry voice.  </p><p>“It would work long enough for our mutual purposes,” Henry replied.  </p><p>Adam scoffed and turned his now dark, angry glare to meet Henry’s. “I assume that if I agree to take this difficult path, you and your colleagues will agree to keep me safe.” Henry nodded. He looked Henry up and down. “And why would you trust me to keep my part of the agreement?”  </p><p>“Because I believe that no matter what level of degeneracy you have now fallen into, you have proven to be a man of your word,” Henry began. “It’s simply a fact. You have kept your promise never to harm Abraham in any way. You even helped him to find out who his biological parents were. Both he and I will be eternally grateful for that. That proves that there must still be a shadow of decency left in you.”  </p><p>Adam released his grip on the bars and stood at soldier-like attention once again. After several moments of indecision, he said, “You give me little choice. For now.”  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>A skeptical Mike Hanson listened to Henry fill Reece in on his conversation with Adam and the bargain they’d struck. Reece questioned the older Immortal’s trustworthiness.  </p><p>“Lieutenant, I don’t expect you to fully understand my reasoning behind all this,” Henry attempted to explain. “But whether his past decisions have been good or bad, he has been true to his word.”  </p><p>“Sort of like ‘honor among thieves’,” Mike said. “Only in this case … “ </p><p>“Something like that, Detective,” Henry replied with a shake of his head and a slight smile, although there was very little to smile about regarding the troubled Immortal.  </p><p>“So, we keep him safe from being experimented on,” Jo began, “and he agrees to … stay put.”  </p><p>Henry chuckled. “In a nutshell, yes.”  </p><p>“And what happens when it becomes apparent that he’s not aging?” she asked him.  </p><p>He schooled his features and fell into a pensive mood for he hadn’t quite figured that out yet. “The only thing I can tell you is that I will always be there to see that he remains safe. Imprisoned but safe.”   </p><p>“That might take forever,” Mike muttered.  </p><p>Henry failed to reply. But they each knew that if anyone could stand eternally vigil over the other Immortal, it would be him.  </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV  </p><p> </p><p>Notes:  </p><p> </p><p>Is Adam merely biding his time until he can escape; for is there really any way to contain him? Hopefully, his immortality will eventually expire and Henry can really relax one day. Maybe in a hundred thousand years. Who knows?  </p><p>But Adam definitely doesn’t want to go through what he did at the hands of the deranged Josef Mengele during the Second World War. Regular prison or maybe Club Fed would not be so unbearable to him. At least for a while.  </p><p>The next chapter will speak to Adam’s trial and incarceration. Naturally, he won’t elect to have a jury trial for he realizes that the fewer witnesses to his record of crimes, the better. But will things go that smoothly? Nope (shaking my head and grinning). Nope. To all still following along with this story, Thank You, stay tuned, and stay safe. </p>
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<a name="section0012"><h2>12. Half-Shell Lies Ch 12 Trial & Tribulation</h2></a>
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    <p>The criminal justice system moves slowly most of the time but not when it came to bringing Adam to trial. Even though he had initially waived his rights, he remained adamant about not having a jury trial. However, at his arraignment one week later, a very pretty, 20-ish Asian woman in a gray, two-piece business suit sat next to him and identified herself as his lawyer, Kathryn Yee.  </p><p>“How does your client (Lewis Farber) plea?” Judge Kimberly Newton asked.  </p><p>“Not guilty, Your Honor,” Kathryn replied, touching her right index finger to the right edge of her black-rimmed eyeglasses.  </p><p>The plea was entered into the record and they moved on to the issue of bail. Naturally, the prosecutor argued against it citing him as a flight risk because of the several different languages the defendant spoke, his sizable and numerous bank accounts, and that he possessed a valid passport. Kathryn eyed her client and leaned in, whispering if he was sure of his decision not to seek bail.  </p><p>“As much as it pains me --- yes,” Adam replied. He had given his word to Henry and he knew that all bets would be off if he tried to get released, if only temporarily, on bail. He didn’t relish looking over his shoulder every other moment to see if black-suited government agents were coming after him.  </p><p>Kathryn reluctantly informed the judge that “My client --- against my counsel --- chooses not to seek bail.”  </p><p>Judge Newton eyed Adam for just a second and asked, “Mr. Farber, you do understand your rights regarding this matter?” Adam responded that he fully understood. “So be it, then.”  </p><p>She turned her attention to the court reporter. “Let the record show that the defendant willfully and knowingly bars his attorney from seeking bail on his behalf.” It was clear that the judge wholeheartedly disagreed with his decision even though it might not have been granted.  </p><p>While the next court date was announced, both Jo and Henry in the spectator section, entertained their thoughts regarding what had just transpired. On the one hand, they felt that the absence of a jury was best (fewer witnesses) but they had not expected him to have obtained counsel; especially since the law degree he’d earned in the late 1970’s from Columbia University would have allowed him to represent himself. He was, surprisingly, still an active member of the NY State Bar. And the fact that he’d elected not to seek bail was gratifying.  It meant that he appeared to be keeping his end of the agreement, however begrudgingly. A guilty plea would have been better, they felt. It would have hurried things along a bit better; but most defendants pleaded not guilty, so they just had to roll with it.  </p><p>Adam was taken out of the courtroom back to his cell with just a passing glance at Henry. Outside the courtroom, the duo caught up with his attorney.  </p><p>“Ms. Yee,” Jo began, “Det. Jo Martinez. Remember me?”   </p><p>“Yes, Detective,” she replied. “Nice to see you again.”  </p><p>Henry could sense the tension of adversarial professionals between the two women, though. He could tell that they had “history” with each other.  </p><p>“Really?” Jo asked. “Wish I could say the same. The last time we met was during the Schaeffer rape and murder trial. You were part of a team of attorneys back then.”  </p><p>“I’m, uh, no longer with that big outfit,” she said. “Started my own firm a little while ago. And by my recollection, you weren’t too happy back then.”  </p><p>“Well, that’s probably because you helped a violent sex offender get off,” Jo told her, unable to hide her contempt. “How long have you been out on your own?”  </p><p>“Since I got the call from Dr. Farber a week ago,” she replied. “I win this case for him and I can write my own ticket from here on.” Her cell phone buzzed, and she fished it out of her pocket. “I’ve gotta take this,” she told them and quickly walked away engaged animatedly in the phone conversation.  </p><p>“Hmmm. Odd that he would seek the services of an untried attorney,” Henry said as he watched her board an elevator.  </p><p>“She’s hardly untried, as you say,” Jo warned him. “It was because of her contributions to Gabriel Schaeffer’s defense that he walked on the rape charge and was able to plead down to involuntary manslaughter on the murder charge.” She scoffed and looked disparagingly at the elevator doors as they closed on the young lawyer.  </p><p>“Ms. Yee sounds a bit more competent and dedicated than we need her to be,” Henry reluctantly acknowledged.  </p><p>“Let’s hope that she’s not as successful her first time out of the gate alone,” Jo replied. “Do you still think that you can trust him to ‘stay put’ as agreed?”  </p><p>Henry sighed heavily. “One can only hope, Detective.”  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>Luckily, Adam’s next day in court went more as Team Morgan had hoped. The State, wishing to focus on only the Glausser murder case, presented a convincing case against him. The prosecutor believed that the DNA in the DeSoto case and the three older cases were too minuscule and circumstantial to be of much use in obtaining a conviction. Once he was convicted, they hoped to present more solid evidence in the other cases later.    </p><p>Ms. Yee took over for the defense and argued that the evidence in the Glausser case, as well, was circumstantial.  </p><p>“My client admits to having known the decedent for several years,” she stated, “when they worked to return artifacts stolen by the Nazis in World War II to their rightful owners. He also admits to having had a difference of opinion with the decedent from time to time on how to best accomplish that difficult and, might I add, honorable task. But, Your Honor, there is absolutely no evidence connecting him to the actual murder or crime scene.”  </p><p>She explained further that although DNA matching her client’s was obtained from the decedent’s ring, “After a thorough medical examination, no corresponding injury was found on his body.”  </p><p>Something that Henry had feared would come up since Adam, like himself, retained only their healed original wounds that had taken their lives and transformed them into Immortals.  </p><p>Opening statements given, the prosecutor, Assistant DA Marvin Belson, took over again. “Your Honor, the State calls as its first witness, Dr. Henry Mor ---.”   </p><p>Adam suddenly shot up from his seat and loudly stated, “Your Honor, I’d like to change my plea to Guilty.”  </p><p>Kathryn, alarmed and seemingly caught off guard, pulled at his arm and then stood up as well. “Your Honor, I request a short recess so that I may confer with my client.”  </p><p>“I’m guilty,” Adam calmly reiterated. “There is simply no need for a recess.”  </p><p>He ignored his attorney, who talked over him. The judge banged her gavel to regain order then granted a 15-minute recess so that Ms. Yee and her client could “get on the same page, if possible.”  </p><p>Assistant DA Belson scratched the back of his head and turned around to face Jo and Henry as they stood just behind the gallery railing. “Looks like this will be one of the easier wins,” he wryly stated. “Maybe I won’t need to call you or any other witness at all.”  </p><p>“Let’s, ah, hope so,” Henry replied and shared a knowing look with Jo.  </p><p>As the three of them walked out of the courtroom, Jo noted there seemed to be no surviving family members, or co-workers, or friends present who had been associated with Glausser. “Not even a curious neighbor,” she noted.  </p><p>“It would seem that he, like Haas, chose to keep a low profile with most everyone,” Henry suggested. “Possibly because of the secretive nature of their endeavors.”  </p><p>“But when greed got the better of him,” Jo began, “he was finally ready to pop the cork and party.”  </p><p>“Which proved to be his undoing,” Henry stated.  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>In a small room adjacent to the courtroom, an agitated Kathryn questioned her annoyingly calm client.  </p><p>“Dr. Farber, are you crazy?” she angrily demanded, the blunt edges of her short hairdo grazing her jawlines. “Should I change your plea to Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity?”  </p><p>Adam kept his head down and followed her with his eyes as she paced in front of him on the other side of the small table. He then raised his head and replied, “I’m merely being truthful, Counselor. You do require the truth from your clients, don’t you?” She stopped pacing and frowned at him with her mouth open in disbelief. “And I do appreciate your efforts on my behalf but ... let’s not drag this out. Guilty.”  </p><p>She shook her head and sat down next to him. “We can win this,” she said in a hoarse, desperate whisper. “Do you really want to go down for this if you don’t have to?”  </p><p>No. He really didn’t. But the alternative had been lain out for him and biding his time was the safer choice --- for now. There would come a time, though, when it would no longer be possible to maintain his status as a guest of the state. He could wait.  </p><p>“This isn’t about you, Counselor,” he chided her. “Guilty; and we can all leave early.”  </p><p>Kathryn said nothing as she sat back in her chair and eyed him up and down. After a few moments, she said, “Alright. But you’re making a big mistake.”  </p><p>The trial resumed and the judge announced that she would render her verdict the next day. “I feel we all need a cooling-off period,” she said in defense of her decision. “Court is adjourned until tomorrow morning, 10:30 AM.”  </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>The next morning, a cuffed and shackled Adam was boarded into the back of an SUV headed for a Club Fed destination in upstate New York. Earlier that morning, the judge had rendered a verdict of Guilty and sentenced him to life without the possibility of parole for the murder of Julian Glausser.  </p><p>“Why does he seem to be getting the VIP treatment?” Prosecutor Belson asked as he watched, along with Jo and Henry, the SUV pull away from the back of the courthouse.  </p><p>“He’s, um, agreed to provide information on another case,” Jo told him. “Part of a plea-bargaining agreement,” she added, hoping Belson would buy the lie.  </p><p>“Not any bargain I struck with them,” Belson replied. “I’ll bet somebody’s pocket is getting lined with some of the money from one of his large bank accounts.” He sighed and turned to leave. “But … not my concern anymore. A win is a win.” He then left.  </p><p>The lady detective and her ME, likewise, left in her car and headed for the precinct.  </p><p>Twenty minutes later, the SUV with Adam in the back of it motored along on the freeway. He entertained thoughts of the minimum-security institution’s tennis court, beautiful views of the ocean and mountains, and the townhouse-like dwelling he expected to be living in. Heck, he might even participate in the baseball games; he could pitch a pretty fair curveball. But he soon sensed that something was wrong. The driver had missed the turnoff. Not by design, though. It appeared that their vehicle was being attacked. He said nothing as it was jostled on the right side by a pickup truck. The driver cursed and reached for his radio mic. Adam tensed as he listened to him report the problem to dispatch.  </p><p>“We have a situation,” he barked into the mic. “A pickup in the next lane forced me to miss the turnoff.” The driver reported their location and described the vehicle. “The windows are tinted. I can’t see the driver or if there are any other occupants.” </p><p>“Hold on everyone,” he told Adam and his partner in the front passenger seat. “Looks like we’re being forced off the road.”  </p><p>Adam remained calm and alert even though his throat went dry and his heart rate ticked up. He’d been in situations like this before as he immediately assessed that this was an attempted abduction. An escape formulated in his mind in order to avoid that. It was much, much sooner than he had planned but the present situation now dictated what actions he felt he must take.  </p><p>The truck sideswiped the SUV repeatedly and forced it over to the left and into the wide, grassy median that separated the two directions of traffic.  </p><p>“Hang on, folks,” the driver, Steve MacIntosh, a former Navy Seal, calmly advised his partner and Adam. “I see an opening and I’m gonna take it.”  </p><p>The truck screeched to a halt in front of the SUV and the driver side door swung open. A tank-topped, tattooed young man in jeans with a waist-length, brown ponytail jumped out of the car, pointing his gun at the driver and yelled, “Everybody out! Now! Get out now!”  </p><p>MacIntosh raised his hands, as did his partner, Rance Barrow. He made eye contact with the gunman and nodded. Although staring down the business end of an AK-47, Macintosh had kept the SUV in drive and his foot on the brake.  </p><p>“When I say ‘Now’,” he told Adam and Barrow, duck --- NOW!”  </p><p>He stomped on the accelerator and the SUV lurched forward and piled into the side of the truck, totaling it as it powered forward and away from the gunman. Bullets peppered the SUV but did not penetrate the bullet-proof glass. He uprighted himself and barreled back onto the freeway.   </p><p>“Stay down, Farber!” he loudly instructed Adam, who needed no prompting.  </p><p>Flashing red lights were seen and sirens were heard on the other side of the freeway. State police in two cars and on two motorcycles entered the grassy median as the SUV zipped past them. They brought down the gunman when they returned his fire.  </p><p>“Thank God for the Cavalry,” MacIntosh chortled as he slowed the vehicle and brought it to a stop in the emergency zone past the grassy median and next to the center divide. The radio crackled with a voice only vaguely familiar to Adam. MacIntosh picked up the mic and responded.  </p><p>“Yes, Lt. Reece,” MacIntosh replied. “We’re unharmed.” He looked over his shoulder at a now upright Adam and said, “The prisoner, as well, is unharmed.”  </p><p>Admittedly, there wasn’t much anymore that surprised Adam or garnered a smile from him. However, this did. Being kept safe, as promised, by Henry and his law enforcement friends … made him smile. Made him almost wish that … somehow … he was worthy to be protected. His past was his past, though, he resignedly told himself. There was nothing more for him to do now but to keep his part of the bargain for as long as he could and after, let the future unfold as it may.   </p><p> </p><p>vvvv  </p><p> </p><p>Lt. Reece, having been patched through to MacIntosh through dispatch, ended the call and turned a relieved countenance to her two detectives and their ME.  </p><p>“What’s going to happen now?” Henry asked.  </p><p>“They’ve already transferred him to another vehicle and he’s on his way to ClubFed with a police escort,” Reece replied. A smile curved her lips as a thought crossed her mind. “Do you really think that he believed we were piping his likeness into Times Square on the jumbotron?”  </p><p>Henry’s eyebrows perked up and he chuckled. “It would seem so.”  </p><p>Jo’s and Mike’s jaws dropped. “You, you mean that was all a hoax?” she asked.  </p><p>Reece and Henry both grinned and nodded.  </p><p>“It looked so real,” Hanson said, amazed. “Ya had me believin’ it!”   </p><p>“Yes, thanks to Lucas and his knowledge of movie magic,” Henry stated with a toothy grin. “The young man just may have a future in cinema one day,” he proudly speculated. </p><p>“You got him again!” Jo happily exclaimed. Her smile faltered a bit. “Was that attempted abduction and rescue staged, too?”  </p><p>“Oh, no,” Reece replied. “That was real. And you won’t believe who was behind the attempted abduction --- his attorney, Kathryn Yee. They found her in the pursuit vehicle injured but alive.”  </p><p>The gaiety abruptly left the room.  </p><p>“You mean sh-she knows about ... Adam?” Jo asked, her voice faltering. </p><p>Obviously, she did even though no one offered a response to Jo’s question. What troubled them all was the fact that there might be others out there who knew about Adam’s condition, as well.  </p><p>“If she was able to find out about him,” Mike began before his voice trailed off as he cast a concerned look at Henry. “Sorry, Doc.”  </p><p>“I appreciate your concern for my safety, Detective,” he replied. “But the possibility of someone wishing to abduct or harm me because of my condition is something I realize I have to live with. Every day that I leave my home and venture out could be the day the possibility is realized. However, it is not too dissimilar from what each of you must consider each day you leave your homes to do your jobs. Jobs fraught with danger.”  </p><p>“We have a choice, though, Henry,” Jo quietly said to him.  </p><p>“Granted, I have no choice but to meet each day for as long as fate would have me to,” he replied. “But the danger for each of us is still undeniably present.”  </p><p>Wishing to lighten the mood, Hanson turned the conversation back to Lucas. “He was able to pull that hoax off from his sickbed. Great kid.” He looked at each one of them and quickly added, “Don’t tell ‘im I said that! It’ll go to his head.”  </p><p>They responded with laughter and then the three of them left Reece’s office. Mike sat down at his desk and dove into replying to the few messages and emails he’d received. Jo followed Henry out to the elevators.  </p><p>“Have we won?” she asked, unable to hide her concern and worry.  </p><p>“A victory against Adam is only a temporary one at best,” Henry reluctantly disclosed. “But for now, I believe we have.”  </p><p>He tilted his head to the side as he studied her with his lips pursed into a slight smile. “The question is --- have I won?” She frowned, confused. “Your forgiveness for … for having held the truth from you regarding this matter.”  </p><p>She did. She understood why he had. But it still hurt a bit that he hadn’t trusted her at the time. “Well, sort of,” she replied, working to keep from smiling. “We can … go somewhere and talk about it.”  </p><p>“It has been a while since we’ve had time to just … sit and talk,” he agreed, working to keep his own smile from growing broader. “Enjoy each other’s company. And I’d greatly appreciate the opportunity to try to win your full forgiveness,” he added.  </p><p>Damn! She knew she couldn’t say no when he said it with that low, sexy voice and those puppy dog eyes. She looked around to make sure no one was hearing or noticing them or the blush on her cheeks. They agreed to meet in front of the precinct after work.  </p><p>On the other side of the bullpen, someone had noticed, though surreptitiously, not wanting to embarrass the late-blooming couple. Mike discreetly noted the time and incident on a yellow sticky and then stuck it to the inside bottom at the back of his desk drawer. He shook his head and thought maybe now since Henry’s secret had been revealed, the reluctant lovebirds were finally making plans to move their relationship up a notch or two.  </p><p>  </p><p>VVVVVVVV  </p><p> </p><p>Notes:  </p><p> </p><p>I apologize for having taken so long to post this newest chapter. You guessed it: Internet problems again. Grrrr!!! But I hope you like it. Thanks! </p><p> </p><p>Information on minimum-security institutions found at </p><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Club_Fed"> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Club_Fed </a>  </p><p>and  </p><p><a href="https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/mp-vows-to-look-into-summer-camp-like-conditions-at-b-c-prison">https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/mp-vows-to-look-into-summer-camp-like-conditions-at-b-c-prison </a> </p>
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<a name="section0013"><h2>13. Half-Shell Lies Ch 13 END</h2></a>
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    <p><em> “It would be nice if we could just sit, talk, enjoy each other’s company,” Henry told Jo. “And I’d greatly appreciate the opportunity to try to win your full forgiveness,” he added. </em>  </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV  </p><p> </p><p>Jo pulled away from the pleasurably long kiss with Henry to catch her breath. Wow, she thought to herself. What had ever possessed them to wait this long before doing this? And despite it being their first kiss, it also counted as a makeup session! She looked up into his eyes, seeing him again as if for the first time and hoping that he could see the forgiveness in her eyes. It was going to take a lot to get to fully know, fully understand this man --- as if that were possible with anyone --- but she knew that she was definitely going to enjoy doing so.  </p><p>Henry took in a breath and let it out softly. He continued to hold her close with one arm wrapped around her waist and cupped the side of her face with his free hand. While he gently rubbed the lower edge of her lip with his thumb, laughter danced in his eyes as he gazed into hers. “I thought you said that we should get off by ourselves and talk.”  </p><p>“Um, well … this, too,” she blushingly admitted with a grin. She took advantage of his unbuttoned dress shirt and traced a finger over the scar on his chest. Satisfied at the pleasured reaction it evoked from him, she then spread her fingers out and traveled them up his chest and snaked her arm around his neck.  </p><p>“I agree,” he whispered. “This, too.”  </p><p>Their lips met again in a heartwarming and almost heart stopping kiss.  There was a lot they needed to discuss but in these few, stolen moments, he preferred they speak the language of love.  </p><p>vvvv  </p><p>The next morning, Jo, Henry, and Mike filed out of Lt. Reece’s office. She had shared with them how Kathyryn Yee had confessed to finding out about Adam and his unnaturally long life while performing a routine background check on him before she’d agreed to represent him. It had been her plan to get him off so that he’d walk free. After which she planned to “sell” him to a human trafficking ring for a large sum of money.  </p><p> </p><p><em> “His guilty plea gummed up her plans a bit,” Mike said.  </em> </p><p><em> “But not for long,” Jo noted, shaking her head. “She always seems to have an ace up her sleeve.”  </em> </p><p><em> “And as far as we have been able to determine,” Reece began, eyeing Henry, “she only found out about him. No one else.”  </em> </p><p><em> Henry took in and blew out a sigh of relief. “That’s, ah, good to know.”  </em> </p><p><em> “And,” Reece continued, eyeing Jo, “we won’t be seeing her in anyone’s courtroom either in the near or far future since she’s being disbarred.”  </em> </p><p><em> “That’s really good to know,” Jo said with a grin.  </em> </p><p> </p><p>Mike and Jo sat down at their respective desks. His phone rang and he answered it while Henry poised in front of Jo’s desk.  </p><p>“How’s Lucas Spielberg doing?” Jo asked jokingly.  </p><p>Henry chuckled and replied, “He should be able to return to work soon. The events of the past 24 hours have served to sap him of his strength more than he had anticipated. I advised him to rest for the next two days.”  </p><p>Right on cue, Mike hung up and tore a piece of paper off of the notepad on his desk. “Life goes on, or rather death does,” he told them and stood up. “We got a body.” He walked over to where they both now stood while reading the notes he’d taken. “Place called Aveda Institute over on Spring Street. Seems that one of the students while shavin’ a guy cut things a little too close,” he said while running a finger across his throat.   </p><p>The three of them quickly headed out of the precinct to assess the situation. Life and death did indeed go on.  </p><p> </p><p>VVVVVVVV </p><p> </p><p>Notes:  </p><p>There is an actual Aveda Institute on Spring Street in NYC. Their web site is https://avedaarts.edu </p><p>Thank you all for following along with this story; I really appreciate it. Hope you liked it. And it looks like this will be the last story I post on ff.net. So many 503 Error codes trying to post this last chapter. Finally posted it but something's up with that site. Too bad. Only AO3 for me going forward.</p>
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